Doxy Prep - any experience?

[+ JEC]

Hello, there is a new(er) form of Prep for bacterial STIs (Gonorrhea, Syphilis, Chlamydia), basically you can either take 100mg of Doxycycline daily; or 200mg of Doxy within 24 hours after sex. It is said to reduce the possibility of contracting bacterial STIs by 70%. Anyone have any experience with this to share?

[Rudynate]

I don't know what the therapeutic dose is for NG, but I had to have it once. At that time, the protocol was to give oral and injection. I had serious diarrhea for days afterward.

[+ FrankR]

Hello, there is a new(er) form of Prep for bacterial STIs (Gonorrhea, Syphilis, Chlamydia), basically you can either take 100mg of Doxycycline daily; or 200mg of Doxy within 24 hours after sex. It is said to reduce the possibility of contracting bacterial STIs by 70%. Anyone have any experience with this to share?

Why does the concept of taking an antibiotic every day sound like a bad idea? Surely there must be concerns around creating more drug resistant bacterial strains? ?

[+ BenjaminNicholas]

This is an interesting approach, but only for what many doctor's would consider very high-risk patients... ie, filthy, filthy tramps.

https://www.sfaf.org/collections/beta/we-asked-clinicians-would-you-prescribe-doxycycline-to-someone-for-sti-prevention/

There's already a fair amount of antibiotic resistance out there and I don't think this would do society-at-large any good in the long run.

I hope I'm wrong. Any new form of preventative care is a-ok in my book.

[Guest]

Taking daily doxycycline would probably work for chlamydia. I'm not sure about GC or syphilis. Will make you sensitive to sunburn and skin cancer. It will also affect the good bacteria in our body/microbiome.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_microbiome

Edited October 15, 2020 by Unicorn

[DR FREUD]

I was hospitalized 3 years ago with extreme sepsis and MRSA. For three weeks i was confined to the hospital with two operations and IV antibiotics 3 times daily. After getting out I had 4 additional outbreaks about every 4 months. They were very small and I caught them very early. The main doctor at the hospital said this would probably happen. Each time 10 days of doxycycline and daily cleaning and repacking of small wound. I was out of state for final episode at that wound doctor put me on doxy 100 mg daily for a year and said MRSA would most likely not come back. I stayed the course for 8 months and haven't had a recurrence for 2 years since. I was originally concerned about taking it for a year but all research said it was safe. Its been wonderful to be free from the MRSA and trips to wound care.

[Rod Hagen]

Taking daily doxycycline would probably work for chlamydia. I'm not sure about GC or syphilis. Will make you sensitive to sunburn and skin cancer. It will also affect the good bacteria in our body/microbiome.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_microbiome

 

I got food poisoning 20 years ago so bad I ended up in the ER (not the first or last time that happened). The doc sent me home with an Antibiotic prescription. I stupidly did not pay attention to the attached paperwork, and took a boat to Catalina two days later. Even with protective lotion I got horribly sunburned.

[Guest]

Using doxy as a prophylaxis has a well-established precedent: malaria. It's used for short trips and long stays in malarial areas, and has not (yet) led to doxy-resistant malaria. Aside from the skin sensitivity some people get, the side effects seem to be minimal.

 

Does that mean it's a good idea to use it in the same way for STIs? I don't know, I'm not a doctor. Obviously, avoiding malaria in the tropics is a different calculus from avoiding STIs in the comfort of your own home. Maybe a say, 2-week erotic bender could be seen as analogous to a 2-week trip to the tropics. Personally, I'm still uncomfortable with the idea of chronic antibiotic usage, my sense is that we still understand too little of the microbiology of our bodies to say for sure what effect they have on our resident fauna.

[EastCoastBtm]

Starting to see this in some provider ads......

[lonely_john]

I don't have sex often and an additional layer of protection (as I thought in my mind) besides PrEP sounded like a good idea, in the context of condomless sex, but every doctor that I've seen in Canada has advised against this because of the potential development of antibiotic resistant bacteria.

[azulpalido]

Tried it for about 6 months. Worked like a charm but would make me nauseous unless I had some with food (did the 200mg as needed approach).

Stopped using it because I stopped seeing providers (covid and such)