Chlamydia Treatment Online

Yes, if you’re 18 or over and you’ve tested positive for chlamydia, or a sexual partner has. You complete a confidential online consultation, and a GPhC-registered pharmacist independent prescriber checks whether treatment is safe and suitable for you. The service isn’t suitable if you’re pregnant, might be pregnant or are breastfeeding, or if you have symptoms such as pelvic pain, testicular pain or a fever, which need an examination.

UK guidance recommends doxycycline 100mg twice a day for 7 days as the first choice. If you can’t take doxycycline, for example because you’re allergic to tetracycline antibiotics, the alternative is a 3-day course of azithromycin. Both clear most infections. The prescriber decides which is right for you after reviewing your consultation.

You need a positive test, or a sexual partner who has tested positive. We don’t treat on symptoms alone, because gonorrhoea, Mycoplasma genitalium and other infections can cause the same symptoms and need different treatment. If you haven’t been tested, NHS sexual health clinics and many councils offer free tests, including home test kits.

Yes. If a sexual partner has tested positive, a prescriber can treat you as a contact without waiting for your own result. It’s still worth getting tested, because a positive result means you also need to tell your other partners. Tests are reliable from about 2 weeks after the last sex you had.

Avoid all sex, including oral sex and sex with a condom, until you and your partner have both finished treatment and any symptoms have gone. With doxycycline, that means finishing the full 7-day course. With azithromycin, wait until 7 days after your last tablet. Having sex sooner risks passing the infection back and forth.

Yes. Anyone you’ve had sex with in the last 6 months should be tested and treated, even if they feel well, because most people with chlamydia have no symptoms. An untreated partner is the most common reason the infection comes straight back. Each person needs their own consultation. If you’d rather not tell a partner yourself, or it doesn’t feel safe, a sexual health clinic can contact them for you without naming you.

Not usually to check the treatment worked, because cure rates are high. A test after treatment is recommended if you’re pregnant, if you missed doses, or if your symptoms haven’t gone. It should be at least 3 weeks after you finish treatment, or it may pick up leftover traces of the bacteria. Separately, if you’re under 25, have another test 2 to 6 months later, because catching it again is common.

Not through our online service. Doxycycline isn’t usually used in pregnancy or while breastfeeding, and treatment in pregnancy needs a test afterwards to confirm the infection has cleared. Chlamydia in pregnancy still needs treating, so please contact your GP, midwife or a sexual health clinic, who can prescribe an antibiotic that’s safe for you.

Symptoms such as unusual discharge or pain when passing urine usually begin to settle within a few days and have often gone within one to two weeks. The infection isn’t cleared the moment symptoms stop, so finish the whole course and avoid sex until treatment is complete, including seven days after the last azithromycin tablet. See a clinician if symptoms are no better two weeks after finishing treatment, or if you develop pain low in your abdomen, pain or swelling in a testicle, a fever, or bleeding between periods.

Yes. Treatment clears the infection you have now, but it doesn’t protect you from catching it again, and reinfection is common. It usually happens when a partner hasn’t been treated, or with a new partner. That’s why partners need testing and treatment, why you should avoid sex until you and your partner have finished treatment, and why retesting is advised. If symptoms come back, or you have a new partner, get tested again.

Oral sex can pass chlamydia on, and it can infect the throat. Anal sex can infect the rectum, and the infection can also be passed by genital contact without penetration or by sharing sex toys. Kissing doesn’t spread chlamydia. Throat and rectal infections usually cause no symptoms at all, so tell whoever arranges your test if you’ve had oral or anal sex, because it changes where the swab needs to be taken from.

Untreated infection can spread beyond where it started. In women it can cause pelvic inflammatory disease, which can lead to long-term pelvic pain, ectopic pregnancy and reduced fertility. In men it can cause epididymo-orchitis, a painful swelling of the testicle. Either sex can develop reactive arthritis, and infection during pregnancy carries risks for the baby. Many people have no symptoms the whole time they’re infected, which is why a positive test should be treated even when you feel completely well.