World AIDS Day is December 1 – do you know your status? Family Health Services (LoveSafely.com) offers free HIV and STI/STD tests to whoever needs them. Their caring and comprehensive providers are available Monday-Friday in Lincoln for all your reproductive health needs.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) approximates 1.2 million people in the U.S. living with HIV and about 13% are unaware. Though there is currently no effective cure for HIV, with proper treatment and early diagnosis, people living with HIV have roughly the same life expectancy as their HIV-negative peers.
You can’t protect yourself if you don’t know what to look for. Sometimes it can be hard to tell if you need to get tested for HIV or an STI/STD (symptoms vary and some infections do not have any symptoms). If you or your partners have any of the symptoms of an STI/STD – or if you’re worried at all that you may have contracted one – you should go ahead and get tested!
Family Health Services is a nonprofit healthcare organization that serves people in nine southeast Nebraska counties. Patients can get reproductive healthcare on an income-based sliding fee basis. More than half of the 1,500 patients that Family Health Services cares for every year are uninsured or underinsured, which qualifies them for free or reduced-price services. The clinic also accepts most private insurance, Medicaid and Every Woman Matters. For more information or to schedule an appointment, visit LoveSafely.com or call (402) 466-1012.