Which pathways can the herpes virus take to form an outbreak on your skin?
Nerves can have many axons which is why the herpes virus can take a number of pathways to your skin. This is why outbreaks can appear in different areas nearby to one another, regardless of what treatment is used. However, each nerve has a particular area of skin that it serves, called a dermatome, so the herpes lesions are limited to the dermatome it initially infected, unless you autoinnoculate (self-infect) yourself somewhere else.
This means that the outbreaks are limited to the body area where the infection exists (for example, the lower back) unless you spread the infection somewhere else (such as to the genitals via oral sex, or to another body area through touch).
