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I just had a lesion cultured and have my doubts about the way my doctor did it. She thought it was probably an inflamed hair follicle anyway so maybe this doesn’t matter but still curious.
She pricked the lesion, which looked like a small white head, with a needle thing. Maybe a tiny amount of fluid came out but it was mainly blood. She then swabbed the lesion/blood/fluid and collected that as a sample. Seems to me that the blood would dilute whatever HSV cells were present right?
Also, if blood was the primary fluid, would that suggest it was not a HSV lesion?
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Herpes lesions don’t normally have blood in them, correct, but if she pricked the lesion with a needle, there could be blood from that. What she did is the usual way to test a lesion for some providers. Other providers kind of scrub the lesion with the swab to break it open. I’m not concerned that the blood is going to alter the results of the test, no. Do you know if what they did was a PCR or a culture? PCR is far more sensitive – if you can ask for that instead of a culture it is best though more expensive.
Terri
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Your doctor would need to call the lab and ask if a PCR can be run either in addition to or instead of a culture. And you would need to call your doctor to initiate that discussion
Terri
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The lab report would say whether this was normal skin bacteria or not – at least my lab reports do! There is definitely pathogenic staph that can cause genital abnormality skin presentations. A lesion with pus in it usually isn’t herpes.
Terri
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