Does the western blot differentiate b/w having HSV 1 vs VZV?

[kerriw]

Hello,

I recently for the first time got tested for HSV 1 and 2. It was a blood test, so no swabs. I’ve never even had a cold sore in my life. I happen to come back positive for HSV 1 with an igG level of 13.2 which I know it’s not in the criteria of being a false positive. I’ve seen test results of my ex who I lived with for a little over 2 years and we always had unprotected sex, we’re talking about more than 400 times in the 2 years + also we would kiss every day of the time we lived together. He got tested for his annual checkup and he always asks for HSV to be included. He came back negative and this was about 6-7 months after we broke up. During the time we were together he also always tested negative.

That being said, when I was about 3 years old I had chickenpox. I want to know if there’s the possibility that my blood test could reflect VZV antibodies and not HSV 1. With that in mind, does the Western blot differentiate b/w proteins or antibodies made up by HSV 1 vs VZV?

I am ok with having HSV 1, don’t think it’s a big deal especially since if I do have HSV 1 I would be asymptomatic, but at the same time, I don’t want to scare my future partners off when this could have been caused by having chickenpox.

[Terri Warren]

Your HSV 1 is not highly positive because you had chicken pox as a child. The test distinguishes those two viruses. You are positive for HSV 1 because you are infected with HSV 1, either orally or genitally. The IgG test misses 30% of HSV 1 infections, so it is possible that your previous partner’s result is a false negative or it is possible that you have this genitally and are infrequently shedding or that you are infected orally and shedding infrequently. But you are infected with HSV 1.

TErri

[kerriw]

Thank you for your reply and clarification. That could be a possibility now that I think about it. Maybe his results have been false negatives. I’m asymptomatic so I have no recollection of when I could have infected him.

Could you elaborate more on the IgG levels? I had read somewhere else that the higher the antibodies the longer it’s been in your system but I understand now that that’s not the case.

Does the IgG level then go higher and lower throughout someone’s life?

[Terri Warren]

One can only infer from index values – for example, yours suggests that you’ve been infected more than three months but we don’t know how long. Someone with a low index value, like 1.5, could be a false positive, could be a new infection or could be just their value and they are simply infected.

The IgG values can certainly vary over a lifetime.

Terri

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