The medical term for shingles is herpes zoster. So, it is herpes. The same virus causes chickenpox.<\/p>\n
After an individual has had chickenpox, the virus lives in the nervous system and is never fully cleared from the body. Under certain circumstances like emotional stress, immune dificiency, chemotherapy, etc. the virus can reactivate causing shingles. Still the exact reason for reactivation is not clearly defined.<\/p>\n
The herpes virus that causes shingles is different from the herpes virus that causes genital herpes and herpes mouth sores. Valacyclovir (Valtrex) is a common medication used in a case like this and as you say it has worked OK. That is a great news.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Hi Guys,
\nI am just wondering …recently I had a rash, so I went to the local HIV clinic to be seen by a specialist.
\nWhat seems very strange is that the rash was on the side of one of my buttocks. I haven’t been sexually active in a few months which I told the specialist.
\nHe said I had shingles and prescribed Valtrex and told me not to worry because anybody can get shingles. It did clear up in a few days and the tingling pains went away.
\nI am wondering could it have been herpes? I’ve been HIV+ for almost 2 years. CD4s are 385 and I am not on meds .<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,29],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-670","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-all-topics","category-opportunistic-infections"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/i-base.info\/qa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/670","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/i-base.info\/qa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/i-base.info\/qa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/i-base.info\/qa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/i-base.info\/qa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=670"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/i-base.info\/qa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/670\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/i-base.info\/qa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=670"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/i-base.info\/qa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=670"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/i-base.info\/qa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=670"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}