NURS 6521 Week 10 Assignment

NURS 6521 Week 10 Assignment – Sexually Transmitted Infection Case Study

Infertility is the inability to conceive after 12 months or more of regular unprotected sexual intercourse. Infertility is a major public health concern worldwide. The burden of infertility is mostly carried by women. Female infertility may be due to a variety of reasons, and which may include endocrine factors, vaginal factors, cervical factors, uterine factors, tubal factors and pelvic-peritoneal factors (Tsevat et al., 2018). Tubal factor infertility is the most common cause of infertility.

STDs and Infertility

Tubal factor infertility is mostly attributed to untreated infections of the female reproductive tract. Sexually transmitted infections can ascend along the reproductive tract and cause inflammation of the fallopian tubes as well as scarring and damage. Scarring of the fallopian tubes interferes with the motility of ova to the uterus.

This also predisposes the woman to an ectopic pregnancy in the event that fertilization occurs. Pelvic-peritoneal adhesions may result from persistent infections. Chlamydia trachomatis and Neisseria gonorrhoeae are the most common causes of STIs associated with tubal factor infertility and pelvic inflammatory disease (Low & Broutet, 2017).

From the case study provided, it is highly likely that the woman has an STI that may have progressed to a PID. This is evidenced by the manifestation of symptoms. She has fever, nausea, vomiting, abdominal pain, and vaginal discharge. Her fertility can be affected because her STI has resulted in the development of PID. The signs of PID are adnexal tenderness, lower abdominal pain, fever, chills and the chandelier sign which is usually an indication of inflammation in the pelvis. Pelvic inflammation causes scarring and adhesions that contribute to tubal factor infertility. The scarring interferes with motility of both the sperms and ova.

Inflammatory Markers and STDs

An STD is an infection. An infection is an inflammatory process. Inflammatory markers such as erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR), C-reactive protein (CRP) and plasma viscosity (PV) are commonly used in primary care for diagnosis of inflammatory conditions such as infections. ESR is defined as the distance that erythrocytes settle in anticoagulated blood in one hour.

CRP is usually better for checking infections (Watson et al., 2019). Other inflammatory markers such as white blood cells are also useful for checking for infections caused by bacteria. Therefore, WBC and CRP will rise in STD or PID. The lab results for this patient indicate a high CRP and WBC levels.

During an infection, pathogen-associated molecular patterns activate pattern recognition receptors of the innate immune system. Proinflammatory and anti-inflammatory mediators are produced as a result with the main aim being to contain the infection. Inflammation is critical in the resolution of infection. Neutrophils are mobilized to the site of infection to try and fight the infection. Neutrophils are the most common type of white blood cells and increase during bacterial infections (McCance & Huether, 2019).

This increase in neutrophils can be elicited by lab testing which is seen as high WBCs. As in the case provided, the patient has both high WBCs and CRPs. The congregation of neutrophils to the site of infection leads to the secretion of inflammatory markers to recruits more defense cells against the infection. This explains the rise in WBCs and other inflammatory markers in STD/PID.

Conclusion

STIs such as chlamydia and gonorrhoea generally affect female fertility due the sequelae of such infections. One such sequelae of such infections is pelvic inflammatory disease which lead to scarring and adhesions in the fallopian tube. Also, STDs are infections that cause an inflammatory process that leads to a rise in inflammatory markers. White blood cells are also recruited to fight infections.