Service Delivery · User preferences & service design

Designing pharmacy-based HIV prevention around what women value

A discrete choice experiment with 599 women on what a pharmacy-based HIV prevention service would need to offer.

University of Washington / Western Kenya / 2023

The challenge

Pregnant women need convenient access to HIV prevention, but moving services into pharmacies only creates value if women choose to use them. The question was what such a service would need to offer to become a real alternative to clinic-based care.

Role

We worked with 599 women in western Kenya to understand what they valued most when choosing where and how to receive HIV prevention services. Using a discrete choice experiment, we examined preferences for features including PrEP availability, STI testing, partner testing, location, travel time, HIV testing method, and cost.

What we did

Developed the service attributes through qualitative work with women in western Kenya, then used a discrete choice experiment with 599 women to test trade-offs across service location, travel time, HIV testing, STI testing, partner testing, PrEP availability, and cost, and examined how preferences differed across groups of women.

What resulted

What the service offered mattered more than simply locating it in a pharmacy. PrEP availability was the strongest driver of choice, followed by STI testing and partner HIV testing.

Published work

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