HPV and warts when your immune system is suppressed

This lesson is part of the WARTES HPV Masterclass. Preview: the first part of the narration.

This video is for patients whose immune system is suppressed, by a medicine or by an illness. In this situation, HPV and warts behave a little differently, and treatment and follow-up are planned with this in mind. In this video, I explain what is different, and what you can do.

Who has a suppressed immune system? People living with HIV. People who had an organ transplant and take transplant medicines. People receiving cancer treatment. People who take immune-suppressing or biologic medicines for rheumatic disease, psoriasis, or inflammatory bowel disease.

And people who take high-dose cortisone for a long time. When the immune system is weaker, the body controls HPV less easily. Warts can be more numerous and larger, and they can spread more easily. Clearing the virus from the area where it settled can also take longer.

The treatment methods are the same: we remove the warts with laser. But in these patients, warts can come back more often.

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