Poz Rapid Swab; Neg Rapid Blood

[nonono]

I went for a general testing yesterday. The rapid oral test came out positive to my shock. I was then taken from the clinic to the hospital for a more detailed blood test including the Weston Blot.

The rapid blood test came out neg. The lady at the hospital assured me it was a false positive which is relatively common in the oral test. I have also had very few sexual encounters and zero unprotected ones.

Still, I had to take the Weston blot test as req'd by state law if you test positive for any of the rapid test. That takes a week to come back. I am super anxious. I've read every case study including this bit which reports zero Weston Blot postives for situations where rapid oral test came pos and rapid blood came out neg:

"However, none of the 327 Western blot positive
persons identified in these studies had a reactive oral fluid
and non-reactive whole blood OraQuick test"

Despite reading this, I am still anxious and feel kind of untrusting of any test. I have an unrelated chronic illness for which I take a few pills a day. I fear it may cause the western blot to show an inconclusive result leading to monthly testing. Yet if I just never had the rapid swab to begin with and just had rapid blood, I wouldn't even be getting tested by western blot and wouldn't be waiting on any results.

[Andy Velez]

A false positive is not an unusual event. As for worrying about the western blot result, it's a very specifc test and highly sensitive.

If you have not had either unprotected vaginal or anal intercourse then I would expect you to test negative.

[Ann]

No,

I agree with Andy. You are very unlikely to end up with a positive WB. The rapid oral swabs, on the other hand, are somewhat prone to false positive results as you were told.

Stop worrying. You are hiv negative and the WB test is just a formality. Any meds you are on will have no effect on the WB results.

Ann