Dutchy

The NHS don't do a blood test as they do not see the benefit in them, they view herpes as a manageable skin condition and will only confirm it by a swab of an active sore. No sores - no herpes is their view more or less. The knowledge out there is poor, one particular NHS GU clinic I saw the nurse was unaware of what an igg blood test was and went away to ask a Doctor. There are literally 100's of private clinics in the UK who will do a igg blood test for anything between 100 and 200 quid. Be careful though, some of these so called expert clinics also don't know what they're on about. But that said if you know what you want you can request an igg blood test and they will take your money and give you your results in about 24 hours or less and it should tell you whether you have HSV 1 or 2 - but remember it won't tell you where you have it or how long ago you got it. Don't bother with any of the home kit style stuff, all rubbish, get a proper blood sample from a vein that gets sent to a lab.

My igg was 9.7 . For hsv 1 . Hsv2 was less than 0.5 Agree lots of ppl have hsv1 , on their face, and it's not that big a deal. But it's more of a big deal if its genital.

Not sure this will help but thought I'd share what i got told. I went to a STI clinic the other day and discussed my igg test result. I was exposed 6 weeks ago and they said basically no way was that from the recent exposure and it was from old infection from hsv1. I'm in a similar mindset, basically freaking out.

Thanks Grace. But no way of knowing for sure I guess. And no way of knowing where this HSV 1 that is in me will crop up , that is, until it does. Don't suppose there is anyone else out there that can offer expertise in this situation and those results ?? Thanks

Hey Grace Thanks for your reply, you and this forum are great. The range over here is pretty similar to the US style, i.e greater than 1.1 is positive. What does my 9.7 mean though, does anyone know what that equates to ? Also, would it be possible to move from exposure, through the igm phase and into igg in what would be 5.5 weeks since exposure?? Thanks to all for reading / replying

Hi all, I was exposed to someone with the Herpes (type unknown) just under 6 weeks ago. Initially I was advices to do these lateral flow home tests- Igm and Igg tests through a fingerprick of blood . I did and they always came back negative for both, I did them every few days for about 3 weeks. As I was then researching more and realised this was bad advice I looked into further testing and was told by a GP (a Doctor, General Practitioner here in the UK at a supposedly specialised clinic) to have a PCR swab of my urethra which would pick up if I had HSV 1 or 2 . This came back negative. I then researched some more and learnt that the PCR was probably a false negative and then sought out to do an IGG antibody test. This was done yesterday and it came back negative for HSV 2 , but positive for HSV 1 at a level of 9.76. For history, I've not had any symptoms throughout this time, anywhere. No symptoms on my genitals, no sign of cold sores on my mouth. That result is pretty conclusive. But what does that level of index (9.76) mean... would it be at that level all the time throughout my life , or is it fighting a recent infection. I did not ask for igm, as this from what I have read is not an accurate test method and plus, those little lateral flow tests all came back negative for igm in the period that you'd think it would be active. Any opinions / help / guidance would be greatly appreciated.