Table 1.

Barriers and Facilitators of Physical Activity for HIV-Positive Persons.

1. What are the barriers to physical activity?
HIV-related symptoms and  medications	“Medications, depression, changing doctors, and doctors changing your meds. Dizziness from meds, so  having to constantly change what you’re doing.”
	“Well you have good days, and you have bad days, you know. I have an AIDS diagnosis, so my body tells me  when I have to take it easy.”
Motivation	“I know I should exercise, but it’s like uhhh I’ll do it tomorrow, but then tomorrow, it’s the same mindset all  over again.”
Medical (non-HIV specific)	“I was on a donor list for a right hip replacement, and then now I’m on a list for the left. It’s medication  management, and now, I have to do all this stuff with my hip. And, to exercise I have to get through that,  and to get there I have to get passed that. So, with managing pain, along with medications that have me  sedated, I am not going to want to exercise.”
Depression	“Two years ago I went into a depression and then the whole eating thing came along, then all of a sudden  where did the exercise go?”
Aging	“When I was younger, I was always doing something, but I’ll be 45 next week, so I listen to my body, and it  tells me I need to lay down and sleep. So, I listen to my body, and I lay down and sleep, or my body will say,  “No, that part hurts,” and if it hurts, why would I push it?”
	“To me, working out is now a thing of the past. I think it has to do with my age. I used to be that guy who  would wake up each day at five in the morning and go for a jog for about 10 to 15 miles and then go do  gymnastics for three to four hours, and now, I don’t do that anymore.”
Financial	“Well, it’s just that with the financial thing, if I could afford it, I would be at the gym everyday.”
Competing priorities	“I just don’t see where I would have any time to exercise with this whole busy schedule”.
Screen time	“That’s a good point about the whole thing about the computer and the Internet. It’s really become more of  a recreational thing, whereas in the past, I would have thought maybe, ‘oh maybe I should go swimming,’  but now I just want to get online.”
Exercise concerns	“I don’t know about you guys, but I tend to have a fear of exercising because it seems that everything goes  wrong. I went to walk my dog and then something went wrong, and I was hurt and then the doctor said I  have to get surgery on it.”
2. What are the facilitators of physical activity?
Self-motivation	“Yeah, motivation really does have a lot to do with it, and the more you do something, the better you get at  it. Things I haven’t done in a while will start to come back. It’s kind of like when you first start lifting  weights. You watch yourself improve and start feeling better about yourself and all the positive  reinforcements.”
Daily routine and life  circumstances	“I work at the senior living center, and every time I get a call to go do something there, I walk there, so that is  my daily activity.”
	“I walk a lot. Part of the reason I walk a lot is because I don’t have a car, but I do like to walk. I wouldn’t say I  go out to walk, say for 40 or 45 minutes, but I would say that on average, I walk quite a bit during the week.  I would say it’s my primary form of exercise.
Self-care	“You know I also have neuropathy, and walking sooths the neuropathy, so I generally walk throughout the  day. I wake up in the morning, and I’m on my feet.”
Self-tracking	“You know, being able to track it on your iPhone or on your computer—I think that really works and just  setting daily goals for yourself.”
Support from peers, family, and  physicians	“Yeah, I think another thing is having a good relationship with family members, and that they can keep you  moving from time to time when you stop caring about stuff. They can pull you out. Good friends can do  that, too.”
	“It depends on who you hang out with, too. If you hang out with people who like to sit around and watch  movies, then we will just sit around and watch movies. If we like to ride bikes, then we ride bikes. It’s all  about friends. If someone calls me up and says, “Hey, let’s go do this today,” then I’m out the door.”
Caring for an animal	“I have a dog. It’s really been helpful in making me get up and going and doing something. I got a dog in March,  which is really making me more active. When you have a dog you have to go out with your dog. I live close  to a dog park, so I go out there a lot.”