Type-specific culture..

Sorry, I didn't make that clear. What I meant by type-specific was differentiating between Herpes Simplex types 1 or 2. Some less up-to-date doctors or clinics just do a simple culture looking for Herpes Simplex without determining the type even though the type-specific culture testing has been around for a couple of decades. They assume, wrongly, that if it's below the belt it's type 2 while the truth is that about 1/3 of genital herpes cases are actually type 1, usually from the patient receiving oral sex from a partner who carries the type 1 virus as cold sores. An active cold sore is not necessary for transmission, although it makes it a lot more likely. Tweet