Experience with Aldara... "down there?"

July 28, 2009 6:03 PM

Experience with Aldara... "down there?"

My husband and I have been in a monogamous relationship for the past 10 years or so. He has HPV; I do not. I have a screening during each annual pelvic exam and so far, nothing. Also, the warts he has had removed have been typed by a pathologist and are not the type that cause cervical cancer in females.

He has to go to the doctor about once every 12-18 months to get a wart or two removed from his penis. This last time, his dermatologist suggested he try Aldara. The treatment takes 8 to 12 weeks. It's 50-50 odds of the warts coming back, which entices him. But what is not so attractive is the logistics of it all: 8 to 12 weeks of abstinence, right? No one can give a clear answer on whether it's OK or not to continue having sex--with a condom, of course--during treatment. The patient literature we've read does not give a conclusive answer, and the pharmacist told us to be abstinent during the treatment period.

So, those of you who used Aldara for HPV--or anything else in the intimate areas--how did you handle the logistics of it all? I've set up hpvquestion at yahoo dot com for answers as well.

Any other advice or tips for using Aldara on the penis (I can't believe I just typed that!) are also welcome.

Thanks in advance.

posted by anonymous to Health & Fitness (2 answers total)

IANAD but I used to work for a sexual health clinic as a patient educator. IIRC, part of the problem is that Aldara can burn your delicate ladybits if it comes in contact with 'em. Another part is that Aldara can cause quite a bit of irritation as it's treating the affected area, and I'm assuming that would be all kinds of unpleasant for him to play with.

If his current outbreaks are being treated with liquid nitrogen by his dermatologist, recurrence should be fairly low, like 30-70%, and it sounds like he's having pretty infrequent recurrences anyway since he's only requiring treatment every year or so. That makes me wonder why his doc suggested Aldara.

While the Aldara can be self-administered, thus saving him a trip to the clinic, it's an expensive script and is kind of a hassle to use.

Oh, and decathecting: The throwaway she listed is hpvquestion at yahoo!
posted by girlstyle at 7:37 PM on July 28, 2009

Three months of no PIV sex to net a 50% chance to eliminate annual trips to the doctor to get stuff burned off my penis? Seems well worth it. There are all sorts of alternative activities things that can be done in this time. Or you could treat it as a challenge. At any rate I'd go for it and just tough it out.

decathecting writes "Have a mod add a throwaway email address to this posting. A lot of people won't want to respond publicly about such a sensitive issue."

It's there in the second paragraph.
posted by Mitheral at 7:40 PM on July 28, 2009