Sorry I didn’t get to this sooner, I’ve been traveling back from Istanbul where I gave a herpes lecture at a medical meeting. The ELISA test misses about 1 out of 10 cases of HSV 1. Having said that, yes, the western blot is better at HSV 1 detection but not as good as it is for detection of HSV 2. We should have some exact numbers for that later this year. So this means that the ELISA test could have missed your HSV 1 infection both time. In my experience, if it misses it once, it will likely miss is every time. So yes, you can get the western blot drawn, but if it is positive, it cannot tell you whether you have new infection or old infection. The point also is that you have no symptoms. So either way seems to be might be about the same answer. You’ve been having sex without worrying about HSV 1 for years, right? So if the WB is positive, you may have exposed other partners to HSV 1 (not this one) and didn’t know it. Not your fault, fault of the test. At this point, it is good to know that 56% of people in the US from age 14-149 have HSV 1 infection and most don’t know it. If you do plan to not have sex with women you are HSV 1 positive, you are ruling out half the population as potential partners. And for what? A sore that may recur once every other year or so genitally or 3-4 times a year orally, that can usually be stopped at the very beginning with high doses of antiviral medicine. And what will you have missed in return? Perhaps a lovely person, who, like the majority of Americans, has a recurring virus somewhere on her body (many people who test positive for HSV 1 never know where their infection is). Now what will be interesting is what you’ll do with your information from the western blot results. What do you think you will do with the results, positive or negative?
Terri