window period
Time before visibility
A window period is an interval during which a condition exists but cannot yet be detected.
Most commonly used in medicine: the window period for HIV is the time between infection and when antibodies appear on a test.
During this window, someone may test negative while actually being infected and contagious.
The term extends to any gap between an event and its detectability: There's a window period before the drug shows up in screening.
- incubationDevelopment before emergence
- latencyDelay in system response
- detectionAct of finding something
- early detectionFinding something at onset
- testingExamining to evaluate
blood test · HIV · antibodies · immune response · exposure · infection · transmission · high risk · diagnosis · screening · viral · blood · waiting · waiting game · uncertainty · limbo · gap · interval
- HIV/AIDSHIV, AIDS, AIDS crisis, AIDS quilt, antiretrovirals
- Virologyviral replication, viral shedding, bacteriophage, tropism, DNA virus
- diagnostic testsantigen test, blood test, PCR test, swab test, rapid test
- STIschlamydia, gonorrhea, HIV, herpes, syphilis
- bloodborne pathogensHIV, hepatitis B, hepatitis C, Ebola virus, hepatitis
window, period, windows, windowed, windowing, periods, periodic, periodical, periodically