Featured news from NHIVNA
HIV-related news from NAM
Over-the-counter blood test for HIV may be feasible, Spanish study finds
Gus Cairns, 2012-10-26 12:10:00
A study from Madrid has found that 92% of people taking an HIV test could obtain a valid result by testing themselves with the kind of fingerprick point-of-care blood test used at clinics, without any instruction except the brochure the test came with.
The Madrid study also tested people’s ability to recognise positive, negative and invalid test results when shown photos of typical tests. Just over 5% of negative test results were interpreted incorrectly (2.7% as false-positive) and 3.6% of positive test results were interpreted incorrectly (1.1% as false-negative).
Participants were not told their actual test results till the very end of the testing process. Nine out of 519 participants (1.7% or one in 58 participants) had HIV. Out of these, eight had correctly interpreted a picture similar to what their own test result looked like, while the ninth was uncertain whether the picture closest to his own test result was positive or invalid.
After self-testing, 84% of participants said they were more motivated to self-test for HIV again.
Source:1
