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Pelvic inflammatory disease - Management
How should I manage sexual partners?
- Ideally, current partners and recent partners (within the last 6 months) should be seen in a genito-urinary medicine (GUM) clinic, or primary care facility with equivalent expertise for screening, treatment, and contact tracing.
- Partners may need to be managed in primary care if they refuse or are unable to attend a GUM clinic, or if there is likely to be an unacceptable delay in accessing specialist services.
- Test for chlamydia, and offer empirical treatment as available tests have variable sensitivity. For more information, see the CKS topic on Chlamydia - uncomplicated genital.
- Test for gonorrhoea. Only offer treatment for gonorrhoea if either the woman's swabs or her partner's swabs are positive for gonorrhoea. For more information, see the CKS topic on Gonorrhoea.
- If it is not possible to adequately screen the partner for chlamydia and gonorrhoea, empirical treatment for chlamydia and gonorrhoea should be given.
- Advise sexual abstinence until both the woman with pelvic inflammatory disease and her partner have completed the course of treatment. Use a barrier method if sexual intercourse cannot be avoided.
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