The first choice you would make is whether to carry or terminate your pregnancy. If you choose to continue, your first call will be to a medical provider to start pre-natal care. You’ll have almost 9 months to decide if you want to raise the baby or not.

Your girlfriend should take a pregnancy test right away. While pre-cum doesn’t always contain sperm, it is possible to have sufficient amounts to fertilize an egg. Enough time has passed that an accurate result will be available with a home test kit. These tests are quick and easy and can detect HCG (the pregnancy hormone) in the urine just two weeks after ovulation. Pregnancy tests are sold at the Campus Health Pharmacy ($5.99) or any grocery store or pharmacy.

Due to state regulations, The UA Campus Health Service cannot treat minors (under 18) without parental permission. If you are a UA student and your parents signed a “consent to treat minor” form on your behalf, you are clear to receive any treatment you come in for. Rest assured that Campus Health considers you an adult and will not initiate contact to notify your parents about your care (unless it is a life-threatening emergency).

Genital warts are members of the family of viruses called Human papillomavirus (HPV) that are spread by skin-to-skin contact, not by bodily fluids. There are more than 100 different types of HPV. Some types cause common warts on the hands or feet while others cause warts on the g******s. Other types of HPV may cause cellular changes on a woman’s cervix. Human papillomavirus affects 3 out of 4 Americans between the ages of 15 and 49 during their lifetime, although many never have visible...

An Intrauterine device (IUD) is one of the most effective methods of birth control. When used as your sole method, an IUD provides a 99% contraceptive effectiveness rate. While using a condom will provide an additional measure of pregnancy protection, the IUD alone is one of the most effective methods a woman can choose.

The short answer to your question is “it depends.” Just as with any type of physical activity, duration, intensity and body weight are all variables that will make a difference in how many calories are expended during sex. But if you are thinking about skipping your daily bike commute or regular workout at the Rec Center in favor of more“sexercise,” keep in mind that the non-coital forms of physical activity tend to burn more calories per unit of time.

Realizing that things may not be working out the way you want is a good first step. For most individuals who drink, the difference between a fun night out with friends and a night of regrets comes down to one thing – dosage. Light or moderate drinkers tend to enjoy more of the benefits of alcohol social, fun, relaxing) and less of the things most of us try to avoid (regrets, blackouts, hangovers). Even more seriously, heavy drinking is associated with higher rates of unplanned pregnancy,...

While this column usually addresses sexual health and relationship issues among Homo sapiens, the answer to your question underscores the link between humans and other animals in the origin and spread of sexually transmitted diseases (STDs). Yes, STDs are found throughout the animal kingdom, and are common among both domestic and wild animals, infecting everything from cattle to koalas, to dogs, birds and even some invertebrates.

It’s hard to estimate your chances of pregnancy from one sexual encounter. It’s best to assume that without any contraception, being young (and presumably fertile), you are at high risk of getting pregnant. Get to a pharmacy ASAP for Plan B®, also known as the “morning after pill.” A prescription is NOT needed for Plan B® – just talk to the pharmacist and they will sell you the medication after confirming that you are over the age of 18 (Arizona State Law). Women 17 years of age or younger...

Perhaps the only thing that will put your mind at ease is to take a pregnancy test (Campus Health Pharmacy sells them for $4.99). While stimulating each other to orgasm with your hands is very low risk for pregnancy (with intercourse obviously being the highest risk) the key is to make sure your boyfriend ejaculates away from your vagina. As long as the semen doesn’t get near your vulva (the folds covering your vagina) the chance of pregnancy is almost zero.

The “morning after” pill is called Emergency Contraception (EC). There are currently two drugs on the market – Preven® and Plan B®. Preven is actually two pills of progestin (synthetic hormone), while Plan B contains a combination of two different hormones.

It’s smart to be concerned. While the situation you describe is not extremely "high risk" for pregnancy, it’s not zero. Thin underwear isn’t a foolproof barrier and pre-ejaculatory fluid sometimes contains small amounts of sperm. Pre-cum can soak through underwear, allowing mobile sperm to enter the vagina and swim deeper toward the cervix. It only takes one sperm cell to fertilize an egg.

A hickey is a bruise caused by someone sucking or nibbling on the skin of another person. Bruises usually appear when skin is injured by a fall, a bump, or an overzealous romantic partner. Skin discoloration occurs as a result of broken blood vessels and blood leaking into the tissues just below the skin. Women are more prone to bruising than men. During the healing phase, which may take 2 weeks or more, hickies and bruises create a rainbow of colors, including blue, purple, red, and...

While research confirms that men generally think about sex more often than women, m********e more often than women, and have more sexual partners in a lifetime than women, they do not necessarily corner the market on sexual enjoyment. Your self-perceived hypersexuality may mean that you are very “normal & healthy” and simply enjoy having sex more frequently than others. If you are able to control your sexual impulses (rather than them controlling you) and you are not using sex as a...

The Campus Health Service (CHS) performs thousands of tests each year for sexually transmitted diseases. The most common STD tests students choose are HIV, chlamydia, gonorrhea, and herpes. Prior to testing, a doctor or nurse practitioner will discuss your sexual history, signs or symptoms, and do a physical exam, if needed. Call 621-9202 for an appointment. For detailed testing info, go to www.health.arizona.edu and search for “STD testing”.

The withdrawal method may be the oldest form of birth control since it requires nothing more than interrupting intercourse to prevent sperm from entering the vagina. In fact, withdrawal is so basic, people often don’t think of it as a real option. Like any form of birth control, using withdrawal to prevent pregnancy is only as effective as its practice, which requires men to “pull out” at some point prior to ejaculation.

To understand which sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) are curable, we first need to look at their pathogenic, disease-causing origins. The most common STDs are viruses, bacteria, parasites and protozoa. Among these, bacterial and protozoan STDs such as chlamydia, gonorrhea, syphilis and trichomoniasis are readily curable, and have been since the development of antibiotics. In fact, one of the first antibiotics to be developed was Salvarsan, an early treatment for syphillis that also gave...

Campus Health does offer confidential testing for sexually transmitted diseases. Test results become part of your medical record and cannot be accessed by anyone (parent, partner, professor, other medical providers outside Campus Health) without your written authorization.

Reading SexTalk Mondays in The Daily Wildcat is a great place to start. And while this column tends to address specific concerns on sex and relationships, your all-encompassing question nods to the many factors that create a state of sexual well-being. Here are six essentials:

We all know that some amount of stress is normal, and is often necessary for us to be at our best. But when stress begins to pile up, it can create a negative cycle that takes away our desire for sex as well as the enjoyment we derive from it. In this cycle, anxiety from other areas negatively impacts our sex lives, and feeling “sexless” in turn reinforces that anxiety. To further compound the issue, frustrations about sexual performance in the midst of this stress tends to make matters worse.

What you and your guy were doing (sometimes called “outercourse” or the French word for body rubbing: frottage) is fairly safe. And it can feel really good! For many young people, outercourse is a very pleasurable sexual activity that can easily lead to orgasm, and can serve as a way to learn about your body’s sexual response without the risks of intercourse. As long as you keep semen or pre-ejaculate away from the labia of the vagina, outercourse (fingering, rubbing, dry humping, etc) is...

The average age for first-time marriages in the U.S. is 27 for men and 25 for women. Overall, Americans are marrying later and co-habitating more (living together unmarried), as is the case in most industrialized countries worldwide, especially in Europe. Delaying marriage the longest are the Scandinavian countries of Denmark and Sweden, where men and women typically wait until age 33 and 30, respectively.

Fortunately, learning about the menstrual cycle is a lot easier than studying the Krebs cycle, and considerably more interesting than the carbon cycle. Here’s how it works: In a typical 28 day cycle, Day 1 represents the first day that menstrual bleeding begins. Between Day 7 and Day 11, the lining of the uterus thickens and becomes awash in hormones like estrogen. On Day 14, the egg is released, signaling the start of the second half of the cycle, also known as ovulation. If the egg comes...

Consider your own experiences, as they will help in answering your question. Has sex been fun, memorable and a source of pleasure? Has it been consensual? If you answered “no” to any of these, it could mean that it’s time to take a different approach to alcohol and how it affects your relationships and sense of self worth. On the surface it can seem like alcohol makes everything easier. Drinking can make shy people outgoing, the inexperienced seem seasoned and the demure act daring. But...