Pharmacy staff characteristics associated with support for pharmacy-based HIV testing.

Objectives: To determine support of in-pharmacy human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) testing among pharmacy staff and the individual-level characteristics associated with in-pharmacy HIV testing support.

Design: Descriptive, nonexperimental, cross-sectional study.

Setting: New York City (NYC) from January 2008 to March 2009.

Participants: 480 pharmacy staff, including pharmacists, owners/managers, and technicians/clerks.

Intervention: 131 pharmacies registered in the Expanded Syringe Access Program (ESAP) completed a survey.

Main Outcome Measure: Support of in-pharmacy HIV testing.

Results: Support of in-pharmacy HIV testing is high among pharmacy staff (79.4%). Pharmacy staff who supported in-pharmacy vaccinations were significantly more likely to support in-pharmacy HIV testing. Pharmacy staff who thought that selling syringes to injection drug users (IDUs) caused the community to be littered with dirty syringes were significantly less likely to support in-pharmacy HIV testing.

Conclusion: Support for in-pharmacy HIV testing was high among our sample of ESAP pharmacy staff actively involved in nonprescription syringe sales. These findings suggest that active ESAP pharmacy staff may be amenable to providing HIV counseling and testing to IDUs and warrants further investigation.