Helen had caught pubic lice, known as crabs.

The doctor at the clinic gave her a cream and told her to wash all her sheets, clothes, towels and to clean the bathroom thoroughly. She was also told to get in touch with her sexual partner. "But he already knew and had been to the doctor. He wasn't too bothered about it and told people he picked it up from me, which was really embarrassing."

Helen also told her flatmates because of the slight possibility they could become infected.

"So pretty soon everyone knew, which was awful.

There is definitely still a stigma attached to having had an STI even after it's gone. It's crazy . . . we used condoms but I still caught it."

Despite what happened, Helen feels lucky she wasn't diagnosed with something more serious.

"I suppose it was the wake-up call I needed. I've been sexually active since my late teens and would have had more than 20 partners. There would have been times when I haven't used condoms, but I wouldn't do that now. I had been thinking about getting an STI test for ages, but I was freaked out at the thought of what I might have, so I always put it off."

For Ciaran* (25) and Sheila* (26), their experience of getting an STI screen nine months ago was far less traumatic. "We'd been together and monogamous for about six months and neither of us had got tested before. We decided to bite the bullet and get it done together even though we didn't have any symptoms, " said Ciaran. "I rang the Mater [hospital, in Dublin] to make an appointment. I was quite surprised the waiting time was about a month, but we weren't in any mad rush so it was okay. The whole experience was nerve-wracking, though."

Both had many previous sexual partners and had unprotected sex on occasion, but were relieved to find they hadn't contracted anything.

"I think people in their teens and 20s don't worry about STIs half as much as they do about getting pregnant. Half the people I know haven't been tested and many of them would change their partners a lot. When people are drunk especially, using protection goes out the window. Everyone I know, including myself, is far too blase about STIs altogether, " said Sheila.

The latest report from the Health Protection Surveillance Centre (HPSC) confirms that STI notifications continue to spiral and the 20-29 age group accounts for the majority of infections. There were 1,387 STI notifications in the first half of 2006, compared to 1,319 in the same period in 2005. Anogenital warts and chlamydia were the most commonly diagnosed viral and bacterial infections, accounting for 81% of all STIs.

Most worryingly, many potentially infected people still aren't getting tested, according to Dr Aidan O'Hora of the HPSC, one of the authors of the report.

"It is important to remember that the latest statistics are provisional results but, nonetheless, the trend of a rise in infections continues. Chlamydia has been steadily rising over the last few years. The biggest problem is that it's often asymptomatic, so people are passing it on without even realising it. It can lead to very serious problems such as ectopic pregnancies, which means there is a small chance of death."

With waiting times of up to nine weeks for a STI screen in public hospitals around the country, services are over-stretched. "People need access to services in a timely way. Quicker access to services means a reduction in the spreading of infections, " O'Hora said.

A spokesman for the Health Service Executive (HSE) said the Department of Health was considering research carried out last year on sexual health attitudes and behaviour. Arising from this, policy on sexual health at national level will be developed.

There are just two walk-in STI clinics in Ireland . . . the GUIDE clinic at Dublin's St James's Hospital and a specialist clinic at Galway University Hospital . . . but there is no guarantee of being seen at either due to the high number of people presenting.

The GUIDE clinic provides the largest STI screening programme in the country. The Sunday Tribune visited it two weeks in a row to try and access the walk-in service and both times was turned away as it was already full up, despite having arrived each day an hour before the clinic opened.

The atmosphere inside was tense. People kept their heads down for fear of meeting someone they knew. Having arrived after all the tickets were gone, I queued to speak to someone at the desk. In front of me was a nervous man in his 20s who became agitated when he heard he was too late. The receptionist asked the man if he had any symptoms and when he nodded his head yes, she arranged for him to see a nurse.

The Sunday Tribune later spoke to a triage nurse who said: "The tickets are a bit of a lottery.

There are people queuing up from 10am to get a ticket to be seen in the afternoon clinic." While many people are turned away from the clinic each week, people with symptoms will be seen by a nurse, who can pencil in appointments for emergency cases within days, the nurse added.

Because of the long waiting times, many people are opting for private screening, which costs about 150. Kate* (24) says that as soon as she made the decision to get tested recently, she didn't want to have to wait weeks for an appointment.

"I didn't mind paying for it because it's something I was really nervous about, and the last thing I wanted was to meet someone I knew. That said, I do think a better public service should be provided . . . if it was, I wouldn't have had to go private."

The Irish Family Planning Association (IFPA) set up two private STI clinics in Dublin two years ago.

"The demand was there. The public service is under-resourced and people need a nextday service, " said Niall Behan of the IFPA.

"The clinics in hospitals don't have the capacity to meet the demand. There really needs to be more GP training to take the pressure off."

At the moment, Dublin's Mater hospital is running STI training courses for a small number of GPs in a bid to do just that. There are also plans for the same training course in Waterford and Galway. "A lot of the time, patients are going into their GPs and asking about STI services. Most advise patients about various clinics when they could easily carry out the screening themselves with some basic training, " said Dr Jack Lambert, infectious disease consultant at the Mater, who believes the government should invest in STI training for all GPs and make it available on the medical card.

"The public STI clinics cannot quadruple their services. But what could make a real difference is GPs being given the resources and power to get seriously involved with screening.

The medical costs to the state from things like ectopic pregnancies and other problems as a result of undetected STIs could be huge. It's pay now or pay later."

THE USUAL SUSPECTS: SOME OF THE MOST COMMON LEGALLY NOTIFIABLE STIs IN IRELAND

ANO-GENITAL WARTS
Usually first appear as small, painless bumps in, on or around the cervix, vagina, anus, penis or scrotum. They may vary in size and shape and usually appear within weeks or months of sexual contact with an infected person.

CHLAMYDIA
A curable sexually transmitted infection caused by the bacterium cchlamydia trachomatis. It is the most common curable bacterial sexually transmitted infection in the western world and the numbers affected are likely to be underestimated, as at least 70% of women and 50% of men who are infected have no symptoms.

GENITAL HERPES SIMPLEX

An incurable sexually transmitted infection caused by the herpes simplex virus (HSV). Most infected individuals experience no symptoms or mild symptoms. If present, symptoms include one or more blisters/inflammation at the site of infection and a burning sensation during urination.

GONORRHOEA

A curable sexually transmitted infection. The numbers affected are likely to be underestimated, as up to 86% of women and 55% of men have no symptoms. Clinical signs of infection include mucosal inflammation of the urogenital tract, throat and rectum in males and females, and eye infections in babies born to infected mothers.

Serious complications can occasionally occur if infections are not treated.

SYPHILIS

Spread from person to person through direct contact with syphilis sores. Sores occur mainly on the external genitals, vagina and anus or in the rectum. Sores can also occur on the lips and in the mouth. Transmission of the bacterium occurs during vaginal, anal or oral sex. Untreated syphilis can also result in its transmission from a pregnant woman to her foetus.

All definitions courtesy of Health Protection Surveillance Centre