This qualitative study identified facilitators and barriers to pharmacy-based STI service uptake and research recruitment among underserved communities, highlighting multipronged approaches, collaboration, and dismantling systemic oppression as key strategies for improving equity.
Key Findings
Results
Five themes were identified as facilitators and barriers to uptake of pharmacy-based sexual health services by underrepresented communities.
The five themes were: convenience, misunderstandings, historical harm and past experiences, current forms of systemic oppression, and perceptions and fears.
Data were gathered through in-depth semi-structured interviews with pharmacists engaged in pharmacy practice research and community advocacy representatives.
Interviews were inductively coded and underwent thematic analysis.
The study used a qualitative evaluation case study design.
Results
Four themes were identified as facilitators and barriers for the effectiveness of recruitment strategies employed by pharmacy practice research.
The four themes were: type of recruitment strategy, service type and its perceived benefits/relevance, awareness of service options, and difficulties requesting a service.
Participants included pharmacists engaged in pharmacy practice research and community advocacy representatives.
Findings were derived through inductive coding and thematic analysis of semi-structured interview data.
Results
Four themes were identified encompassing strategies for increasing reach of underserved communities to improve equity in pharmacy-based STI services.
The four themes were: multipronged approaches, accessible promotional material and recruitment strategies, collaboration, and dismantling of systemic oppression.
These themes were intended to inform future strategies for both recruiting diverse participants to health research and promoting uptake of pharmacist-provided STI services.
The study specifically targeted strategies for improving reach among underserved communities.
Results
Historical harm and past experiences, as well as current forms of systemic oppression, were identified as barriers to underserved communities accessing pharmacy-based sexual health services.
These barriers were surfaced through qualitative interviews with pharmacists and community advocacy representatives.
Dismantling systemic oppression was also identified as a corresponding strategy theme for improving equity in future services.
The study framed these as part of a broader set of health inequities and systemic barriers that diversity in research is necessary to address.
Background
Recruitment of diverse participant cohorts was identified as a long-standing challenge in clinical and health care system research.
The study noted that diversity is necessary to gain representation of underserved demographics.
The authors highlighted the importance of understanding how to address health inequities and systemic barriers through diverse recruitment.
The study was designed in part to evaluate recruitment strategies and identify facilitators and barriers associated with recruitment and promotional strategies.
What This Means
This research studied why it is difficult to get people from underserved communities to use pharmacy-based sexual health services and to participate in health research. Researchers conducted in-depth interviews with pharmacists involved in research and community advocates, then analyzed the responses to find common themes. They found that things like convenience helped people access services, while misunderstandings, fear, past negative experiences with healthcare, and ongoing systemic inequalities acted as barriers.
The study also looked at what makes recruitment strategies for health research work well or poorly. Key issues included the type of strategy used, whether people understood the relevance of the service, general awareness of available options, and difficulties in actually requesting services. To address these challenges, the researchers identified strategies such as using multiple types of outreach at once, making promotional materials more accessible, building collaborative partnerships, and actively working to dismantle systemic barriers.
This research suggests that improving access to pharmacist-provided STI services and increasing diversity in health research requires more than just advertising — it requires addressing deep-rooted issues like historical mistrust of healthcare systems and ongoing structural inequities. Practical steps like using accessible materials, working with community partners, and taking a multipronged outreach approach may help pharmacies and researchers better serve and include underrepresented groups.
Gonzalez P, Black E, Trenaman S, Wilby K. (2026). Evaluation of recruitment methods and promotional strategies for sexual health services and research.. Journal of the American Pharmacists Association : JAPhA. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.japh.2025.102949