During my first breakout I had my lesions swabbed within several days of developing them. I had them swabbed twice, once at the hospital and once at the clinic. Both swabs came back negative. I healed and moved on but now I believe I'm having a very minor second outbreak. Just a few small dots that are painful. I'm going to have a blood test this week but I just want to know if anyone else has had the same experience with a negative swab test. I thought it would be more accurate. :(
Hey there I have had a negative swab test recently during my first ob. My first was negative then the second was positive . I’m not sure why possibly due to it being the end of the ob maybe .But from what i have seen in some discussions is that if there is an open sore the swab test is more accurate so if there arent any open sores the blood test would be the better option
Same thing happened to me. I was tying to get a diagnosis and got a negative swab result.
I’ve since discovered that the usual reason. Although the outbreak might last a week or so the lesions only shed virus for the first 2-3 days. After that time, even though there is still plenty to see, there is no HSV present for the test to detect.
I recently also had a swab test. it didn’t look like hsv2 . as I had mild burning but no other symptoms. I trust the swab test 99% because my doctor is good and smart. also these days everyone is pretty accurate