Research finds bacterial vaginosis should be seen as a STI

It is a common and serious bacterial health problem that affects one in three women. Now it’s been shown the “quick fix” involves treating their male sexual partners.

Australian researchers have confirmed a cure for a serious bacterial condition that affects one in three women globally.

It is significant for women’s health as the condition called bacterial vaginosis (BV) causes major complications including infertility, miscarriage and premature labour.

Until now only women have been treated for the infection, but new research by Monash University and Alfred Health at the Melbourne Sexual Health Centre today reveals the “quick fix” involves also treating their partners.

The trial found key was treating men at the same time with both an oral antibiotic and antibiotic cream. Picture: iStock

The team said key was to see it as a sexually transmitted infection (STI) and to treat both sexual partners with antibiotics at the same time.

They found that treating male partners with a week-long course of an oral antibiotic and an antibiotic cream, at the time their female partner was treated, greatly improved cure through reducing reinfection, paving the way for this to become universal standard practice.

The authors say the Australian study is a “significant step” to curing and reducing the burden of the condition in women.

In a study published on Thursday in the New England Journal of Medicine, authors Professor Catriona Bradshaw and Dr Lenka Vodstrcil said this was a “significant step” to curing and reducing the burden of the condition in women.

“BV is not just a condition that affects women,” Professor Bradshaw said.

“It is a condition that affects men, it’s just that men generally don’t have symptoms and there’s no test yet to detect it in men.

“This research is going to lead to us looking at developing a test for BV in men.”

Professor Bradshaw said the results of the trial that included 164 Australian couples provided the conclusive evidence needed to show that BV was sexually transmitted.

Professor Catriona Bradshaw from Monash University and the Melbourne Sexual Health Centre has been leading the research for more than two decades. Image: Supplied.

“Our trial shows that reinfection from untreated sex partners is responsible for a very significant proportion of recurrence that women experience after treatment and that BV is a shared responsibility,” she said.

Professor Bradshaw, who has been leading this research globally for more than two decades, said treating women only meant more than 50 per cent got the infection back within three months.

Dr Vodstrcil said having BV was already known to increase the risk of contracting other STIs.

“We’ve suspected for a long time that it’s a sexually transmitted infection (STI), because it has a similar incubation period (after sex) to most STIs and is associated with the same risk factors like chlamydia, such as change in sexual partner and not using condoms,” she said.

So successful has the study been that it was stopped early when it became clear that BV recurrence was more than halved in the partner treatment group compared to treating women alone.

Co-author of the study Dr Lenka Vodstrcil from the Melbourne Sexual Health Centre. Image: Supplied.

“Part of the difficulty in establishing whether BV is sexually transmitted has been that we still don’t know precisely which bacteria are the cause, but advances in genomic sequencing are helping us close in on that mystery,” Professor Bradshaw said.

She said now when a woman develops BV she’s equipped with the knowledge that it is sexually transmitted and can also access partner treatment.

The results have led to the Melbourne Sexual Health Centre changing its clinical practice to treat couples, and developing a new website for health professionals and consumers to assist in prescribing partner treatment for BV in the community.

Visit the website here