Siete años del programa de intercambio de jeringuillas en el Centro Penitenciario de Pamplona (España)

In the prison of Pamplona, capital city of Navarra, a region in the north of Spain, around 35% of the prisoners currently have or have had problems related with intravenous consumption of drugs. The National Department of Prisons which is in charge of the provision of health care to the prisoners, has the mandate to provide similar health programs to those available for the general population. This includes the implementation of harm reduction programs such as needle exchange programs (NEP). In November 1998, a pilot NEP was started in the prison of Pamplona which is still functioning. Different institutions have participated in the development, implementation, coordination and evaluation of the program. Needle exchange in the NEP in Pamplona is personal, which means that a health care worker provides the sterile kits. This allows for undertaking other health interventions. In the seven years the NEP has been operating, no problems have aroused among the program users neither among the prisons staff. The program has achieved a 93% of needle devolutions, and 40% of HIV positive prisoners use it. No increase of injecting drug consumption has been observed. Illegal syringes are not used anymore in the prison and no case of HIV or HCV sero-conversion has been documented. The continuous evaluation of the program and the positive attitude of users and prison’s staff are crucial in the success of the NEP in Pamplona. Key words: Needle-Exchange Programs, Prisons, Evaluation Studies, HIV Infections