Hello. I (35 yr old male) had a protected sexual encounter with a woman who's HIV status I do not know. We had vaginal and anal sex. There was no condom breakage. I had a blood test done at the 24 day mark (I know that is not ideal but I had heavy anxiety). The test came back negative. My health care professional who administered the test said that due to the low probability of transmission, plus the test, there was no reason for further testing. My anxiety, however is still getting the best of me. I have two questions - what sort of test would have been done - this was Southern Vancouver Island - and what is the probability rate of it's effectiveness? As well,perhaps a loaded question, should I be confident in the assessment that no other tests are required?

Home / Answered Questions / Hello. I (35 yr old male) had a protected sexual encounter with a woman who’s HIV status I do not know. We had vaginal and anal sex. There was no condom breakage. I had a blood test done at the 24 day mark (I know that is not ideal but I had heavy anxiety). The test came back negative. My health care professional who administered the test said that due to the low probability of transmission, plus the test, there was no reason for further testing. My anxiety, however is still getting the best of me. I have two questions – what sort of test would have been done – this was Southern Vancouver Island – and what is the probability rate of it’s effectiveness? As well,perhaps a loaded question, should I be confident in the assessment that no other tests are required?

Hello. I (35 yr old male) had a protected sexual encounter with a woman who’s HIV status I do not know. We had vaginal and anal sex. There was no condom breakage. I had a blood test done at the 24 day mark (I know that is not ideal but I had heavy anxiety). The test came back negative. My health care professional who administered the test said that due to the low probability of transmission, plus the test, there was no reason for further testing. My anxiety, however is still getting the best of me. I have two questions – what sort of test would have been done – this was Southern Vancouver Island – and what is the probability rate of it’s effectiveness? As well,perhaps a loaded question, should I be confident in the assessment that no other tests are required?

Thank you for your questions. First, the activity you describe is considered safe sex and it would be most unlikely to have HIV transmitted this way. I am not sure what HIV test was done with your testing. Usually the routine HIV test is the antibody test and according to the information I have; the chance of your test being positive at 21 – 28 day time since exposure is 54-87% if HIV was able to be transmitted. Sometimes anxiety can cause one to think about the possibility of transmission a lot more even though you know it was safe sex. A negative HIV antibody test at 3 months or 90 days post contact would be considered 99-100% accurate and may provide some reassurance to you that HIV was not transmitted. Hope this helps. Health Nurse

This answer was posted on March 24, 2016.

This answer was updated on February 7, 2022.

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