FAQs

What do STI tests for men and women consist of?

Answer

STD tests (or STI tests which is the name more commonly used these days) are tests designed to pick up sexually transmissible infections. The types of tests that may be suggested will depend very much on the history you give the health practitioner, whether you actually have symptoms at the time and the kind of sexual practices you have engaged in.

In women who have had vaginal sex, STI testing will usually include samples of the secretions from high inside the vagina taken on what looks like a long cotton bud. These are called "swabs". In men who have been the active partner in penis-in-vagina or penis-in-anus sex, swabs can be taken from the urethral opening at the end of the penis, though increasingly these days a special urine test is done as an alternative. In some situations a urine test may also be an appropriate alternative in women.

If you have had anal or oral sex, you may also be offered STI testing from these areas. If you have an ulcer on the skin of the mouth or genital area, which is thought to be caused by a sexually transmissible infection, then samples might be taken directly from the ulcer itself.

Depending on your risk, you might also be offered blood tests for STIs like Syphilis, HIV/AIDS and Hepatitis. The decision to have any of these tests is totally yours- and declining to have them will in no way influence your ongoing care. Some tests will give immediate answers, but with others it can take days or even weeks for the test results to come back to the health practitioner. With some STIs there is an "incubation period", which means that if you test for them too early the test will come back as showing there is no infection, even when there is. For this reason, it might sometimes be necessary to repeat the STI tests a little later to be sure the tests are really accurate.

Sometimes treatment will be recommended even before the results of the tests are known. Obviously if an STI is found it is important to treat all sexual partners before you have sex again or it will simply come back again.