Syphilis

It can be serious if it’s left untreated or passed on to a baby during pregnancy or childbirth.

The number of people getting syphilis in Scotland has greatly increased over the last 5 years. You could be at higher risk if you:

are a man who has sex with men have had sex overseas have had multiple sexual partners


The number of people getting syphilis in Scotland has greatly increased over the last 5 years. You could be at higher risk if you:

are a man who has sex with men have had sex overseas have had multiple sexual partners


are a man who has sex with men have had sex overseas have had multiple sexual partners

Symptoms

Many people with syphilis will not notice any symptoms either at the time of infection or later.

Syphilis usually has 3 stages.

The first stage (primary syphilis)

Ten days to 3 months after infection, a small, painless sore or ulcer will appear on the part of your body where the infection was transmitted. This is typically on either the:

penis vagina anus rectum tongue lips

Most people only have one sore, but some people have more.

The sore will then disappear within 2 to 6 weeks. If the condition is not treated, syphilis will move into its second stage.

Swelling in your lymph glands (such as in the neck, groin or armpit) often happens with the ulcers.

The second stage (secondary syphilis)

The symptoms of secondary syphilis will begin a few weeks after the disappearance of the sore. At this stage, common symptoms include:

a non-itchy skin rash appearing anywhere on the body, but commonly on the palms of the hands or soles of the feet tiredness headaches swollen lymph glands

Less common symptoms include:

fever weight loss patchy hair loss joint pains

These symptoms may disappear within a few weeks, or come and go over a period of months.

Syphilis will then move into a stage where you will experience no symptoms, even though you remain infected. This is called ‘latent syphilis’. You can still pass it on during the first year of this stage. However, after a couple of years, you can’t pass the infection to others, even though you remain infected.

The latent stage can continue for many years (even decades) after you first become infected. Without treatment, there is a risk that latent syphilis will move on to the most dangerous stage – tertiary syphilis.

The third stage (tertiary syphilis)

The symptoms of tertiary syphilis can begin years or even decades after the initial infection. Up to 1 in 3 (10 to 30%) people who are not treated for syphilis develop serious symptoms eventually.

The symptoms of tertiary syphilis will depend on what part of the body the infection spreads to. For example, it may affect the brain, nerves, eyes, heart, bones, skin or blood vessels, potentially causing any of the following symptoms:

stroke dementia loss of co-ordination numbness paralysis blindness deafness heart disease skin rashes

At this stage, syphilis can be dangerous enough to cause death.