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Salisbury University Health Services offers STD screening to its
students at a cost of $15.
Results of the STD testing are handled with the utmost
confidentiality, and not shared with others without the
student’s permission.
Allow 40 minutes for the initial STD screening appointment.
Cultures are obtained to screen for the two most common
bacterial
STDs in the United States,
Chlamydia
and gonorrhea.
These cultures are sent to the state lab and typically take two weeks to
process. During the
examination, the Nurse Practitioner will examine for visual
clues of STDs such as crabs, herpes and warts.
If lesions such as blisters suggesting possibility of herpes are
observed, the practitioner may elect to send a herpes culture.
Viral cultures typically take 2-3 weeks to process.
Results will be given to the student during a follow-up appointment.
If these STD results are negative, it is highly recommended that you have
repeat STD testing in 3-6 months if you are concerned
about a recent sexual exposure; early STD infections can be
missed on first screening.
At this time SHS will not
be offering blood testing for syphilis and
HIV.
Students can call Wicomico County Health Department at
410-543-6343 for appointments to be tested.
Hopefully as the
semester progresses we can again offer this service. When
that time comes students wishing to undergo this testing are charged an additional $5.
This appointment involves counseling and signing an informed consent form
prior to blood drawing.
Allow 40 minutes for this appointment.
If you know that you wish to have both blood testing as well as the
Chlamydia and gonorrhea screen, please make it clear at the time you schedule
the appointment. Results of the HIV/syphilis screen are given to the student
during a follow-up appointment in about 2 weeks; this appointment may be
combined with the Chlamydia and gonorrhea results for your convenience.
STD screening
does not test for HPV.
HPVs, or human papilloma viruses, is the set of viruses responsible for
warts.
Some HPVs cause common wart on the hands or plantar warts on the feet and
are not considered sexually transmitted.
Some HPV strains cause genital warts in both sexes.
Some strains prefer areas of mucus membranes such as the vagina; others
prefer the cervix. Some of these
cervical HPVs have been linked to cervical cell changes and cancers in women.
In men, HPV is usually a diagnosis of observation—that is, visual signs
of a wart. In women, external or
vaginal warts might also be visualized.
Very often, those individuals who are infected with HPV have no visible signs of
infection. It is estimated that 3
out of 4 sexually active adults in the US carries some HPV strain; most are
unaware of this and suffer no adverse effects.
It is crucial, however, for all women aged 18 or older or who are
sexually active to get
annual Pap smears to screen for microscopic cellular changes of the
cervix.
Pap smears are not part of the normal STD screen at SHS, but can be
performed at the request of the student and costs $55.
If the Pap smear is abnormal, a “reflex” test of the cells collected at
the time of the Pap smear to check for the high risk HPV strains may be
performed; this would cost an additional $45.
Barrier methods such as male or female
latex condoms are your best protection against STDs, other than
abstinence.
However, condoms do not completely eliminate risk from STDs.
Viruses can still be transferred from person to person despite regular,
conscientious condom use. This is
because skin to skin contact still occurs, allowing for transmission; also,
viruses are smaller than bacteria and therefore may be able to pass through
latex condoms.
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