How long before chlamydia gets worse

Men and women can also get infected with chlamydia in their rectum. This happens either by having receptive anal sex, or by spread from another infected site such as the vagina.

While these infections often cause no symptoms, they can cause. You should be examined by your doctor if you notice any of these symptoms or if your partner has an STD or symptoms of an STD.

STD symptoms can include an unusual sore, a smelly discharge, burning when urinating, or bleeding between periods. Laboratory tests can diagnose chlamydia. Your health care provider may ask you to provide a urine sample or may use or ask you to use a cotton swab to get a sample from your vagina to test for chlamydia.

Yes, chlamydia can be cured with the right treatment. It is important that you take all of the medication your doctor prescribes to cure your infection. When taken properly it will stop the infection and could decrease your chances of having complications later on.

You should not share medication for chlamydia with anyone. Repeat infection with chlamydia is common. You should be tested again about three months after you are treated, even if your sex partner s was treated. You should not have sex again until you and your sex partner s have completed treatment. If your doctor prescribes a single dose of medication, you should wait seven days after taking the medicine before having sex.

If your doctor prescribes a medicine for you to take for seven days, you should wait until you have taken all of the doses before having sex. Damage to the fallopian tubes following PID is a predisposing factor for ectopic pregnancy and infertility [ 2 ]. Chlamydia infection is usually asymptomatic in women, but can be treated with antibiotics when diagnosed [ 5 ].

The estimated mean duration of untreated asymptomatic infection is more than one year in women [ 6 , 7 ]. Early detection and treatment of chlamydia through screening has been proposed as a strategy to prevent PID and subsequent reproductive tract morbidity in sexually active young women [ 8 ]. Three randomised controlled trials have investigated the efficacy of a single chlamydia screening test on the incidence of clinically diagnosed PID with a follow-up period of one year in young women [ 9 — 11 ].

It is important to understand when in the course of infection PID occurs and when screening and treatment should take place to maximise the potential of chlamydia screening to prevent PID, but this is currently unknown. The natural history of untreated chlamydia in humans cannot be directly observed for ethical and logistical reasons and randomised controlled trials do not provide this information because the time from the start of infection is unknown.

It has been suggested that treatment is needed soon after infection, based on observations from an animal model [ 12 ]. Pal et al. Mathematical modelling studies are a valuable tool for investigating hypothetical processes of chlamydia transmission and ascending infection.

Amongst the few mathematical modelling studies with explicit descriptions of progression from chlamydia infection to PID, it has been proposed that PID develops in the first half of a chlamydia infection, in the second half, or can occur at any time during a chlamydia infection [ 13 ]. The objectives of this study were: to investigate how differences in the timing of progression from chlamydia infection to PID affect the outcome of a chlamydia screening intervention; and to estimate the fraction of chlamydia infections that progresses to PID, using a mathematical model to simulate the results of a published randomised controlled trial.

All women provided self-collected vaginal swabs at enrolment and were randomised to immediate testing for chlamydia infection and treatment if positive intervention group , or the collected swabs were stored and tested after one year control group. The prevalence of chlamydia infection was 5.

About The incidence of clinically diagnosed PID by self-report, mostly backed up by examination of medical records after one year was 1. The incidence rates of PID in women with chlamydia infection at baseline were 1. Amongst women in the control group who developed PID, This results in the following system of ordinary differential equations:. Schematic overview of the model framework.

The model has a susceptible-infected-susceptible SIS framework and allows three hypothetical processes for the timing of progression from chlamydia to PID to be investigated. Numbers indicate when during the chlamydia infection progression to PID could happen: 1 immediate progression, 2 constant progression, and 3 progression at the end of infection.

For all three types of progression a certain fraction f of chlamydia-infected women will develop PID. This takes into account the fact that that some women clear the infection rapidly whereas others can remain infected for substantially longer time periods [ 7 ].

At model initiation we simulate the conditions in the two arms in the trial. In the control group, a percentage of women is infected, reflecting the observed baseline prevalence. In the intervention group all women have received treatment but a small percentage remains infected owing to treatment failure see Additional file 1 for more details. We explored three hypothetical processes for the timing of progression from endocervical C. For each type of progression it is assumed that, of all women infected, a certain fraction f will develop PID in the absence of an intervention.

Finally, progression to PID could happen at the end of a chlamydia infection just before natural clearance progression at the end. The cumulative incidence of PID cases caused by C. We assume that a certain proportion x of PID cases in the control group is caused by chlamydia and that the amount caused by other microorganisms is the same in both groups. In the simulated trial it is assumed that the intervention only reduces the incidence of chlamydial PID.

The model estimates the cumulative incidence of chlamydial PID for the intervention group g I and for the control group g C. We get the overall cumulative incidence of PID cases in the intervention group e I and in the control group e C by using the proportion of PID cases caused by chlamydia x , as follows:. Second, we used the maximum likelihood method to obtain the best fit estimate and standard error for the fraction progressing for each type of progression, using the observed cumulative incidences of PID cases in the trial.

Third, we estimated the best fit and standard error for the fraction progressing to PID amongst women who were chlamydia positive at baseline, assuming that all PID cases were caused by C.

Fourth, for each type of progression we used baseline values and the obtained maximum likelihood estimators to determine the time point since start of infection until half of the expected PID cases occurred see Additional file 1 for more details.

A univariable sensitivity analysis was done for all model parameters and the proportion of PID cases caused by chlamydia. We obtained the maximum likelihood estimates for the fraction of women progressing to PID. The maximum likelihood estimates for the fraction of women progressing to PID were determined and the quantiles 0.

Third, we explored the effect of varying the mean time between start of infection and when progression to PID becomes possible. We do this in a model framework similar to the constant progression scenario. We did not fit this model with the additional unknown parameter to the trial data as we have only two data points.

Analytical results were derived in Mathematica and numerical solutions were obtained in R [ 19 , 20 ]. Code files can be obtained from the authors on request. Predicted cumulative incidence of chlamydial PID for the three types of timing of progression.

In people who develop symptoms, it may take several weeks after exposure for symptoms to appear. Men or women who have anal sex can get chlamydia in the anus, which can cause pain, discharge or bleeding.

Chlamydia can also be found in the throats of women and men who have oral sex with an infected partner. There are laboratory tests to diagnose chlamydia. Some can be performed on urine; other tests require that a sample be collected from a site such as the penis or cervix.

The Sexual Health Clinic uses a urine test for chlamydia in all clients. Once diagnosed, a person should tell all recent sex partners so they can see a health care provider and be treated. Persons with a chlamydia infection have an increased chance of getting other infections such as gonorrhea or HIV. Navigation menu.

Who gets chlamydia? How is chlamydia spread? What are the symptoms of chlamydia? When and for how long is a person able to spread chlamydia? Does past infection with chlamydia make a person immune?

Past infection with chlamydia does not make a person immune to chlamydia. What is the treatment for chlamydia?