Treating Chlamydia

Chlamydia has no symptoms at all in as many as 90% of the reported cases. You may find out that you have Chlamydia when your doctor does a routine screen for STDs as part of an annual checkup, or because you�re pregnant. You may find out that you might have the infection because one of your sexual partners was diagnosed.

No matter how you learned about it, though, it is vital that you get treatment as soon as you find out that you may have it. If you don�t, you risk more than just passing it on to someone else. About 40% of all women who are diagnosed with the infection develop PID � pelvic inflammatory disease. PID causes chronic pelvic pain and can result in infertility. Women also run a far greater risk of an ectopic pregnancy, where the baby starts to grow in the fallopian tube. Ectopic pregnancies can be fatal.

Men with untreated Chlamydia also run the risk of becoming infertile. They also may develop scarring of the urethra, inflammation of the testicles and blockage of the tube that carries sperm from the testicles. Chlamydia may also cause prostatitis � an inflamed prostate gland. There�s also some suggestion that women with the disease are more likely to develop cervical cancer. All of that can be avoided if you treat the disease as soon as you know that you may have it.

Fortunately, Treatment is easy. In most cases, it is cured by a course of antibiotics. There are several antibiotics that your doctor might choose to prescribe if you have the disease. They include:

Doxycycline is one of the antibiotics most frequently prescribed to treat Chlamydia. Usually, the doctor will prescribe 2 capsules a day for ten days. It�s very important to take all of the doses as prescribed or the antibiotic may not clear up the infection. The most common side effects of doxycycline are sensitivity to sunlight and mild stomach upset.

Azithromycin is another antibiotic that is often prescribed to treat Chlamydia. Many doctors choose it because it can be given in one dose, making it more likely that patients will finish all their medicine. Azithromycin can cause mild stomach upset and nausea for a few hours after taking it.

Erythromycin is sometimes prescribed for those that can�t take doxycycline or azithromycin, particularly pregnant women.

Amoxicillin may be prescribed, particularly for pregnant women, because it is the easiest of the medications to tolerate. Both erythromycin and amoxicillin are usually prescribed for 7 days, three times a day.

It is important that all the medicine be taken as your doctor tells you. It is also important that you inform anyone that you�ve been sexually intimate with so that they can also be treated, and that you don�t have sex with anyone until your treatment is complete. If you had a single dose of azithromycin, you should wait seven days after taking it before having sex with anyone to avoid passing on the infection.