“To treat me, you need to know who I am,” says Liz Margolies, founder and executive director of the National LGBT Cancer Network. I have firsthand experience with doctors not knowing fully who I am: At my local hospital, the patient information form I filled out years ago – and which still is being used – lists only “single,” “married,” and “divorced” as options for marital status. There’s no option for “partnered,” “widowed,” or “separated,” all of which give health-care professionals much-needed information about an individual’s support system (or lack thereof). That’s not exclusively an LGBT issue, since it affects people in many different life situations, but a more expansive list of choices would provide a conversation-starter about orientation and identity.
“Intake forms are a powerful and early indicator of the welcome LGBT [people] can expect in a health care setting,” says Margolies. At most facilities, the form allows for only “male” and “female” when it comes to gender, which completely erases anyone who identifies as transgender or intersex.
And that’s just the waiting room. According to a study by the National Center for Transgender Equality and the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, 37 percent of transgender Americans have experienced discrimination in a hospital or doctor’s office. Meanwhile, a staggering 80 percent of first-year medical students expressed some form of bias against lesbians and gays, reported the National Institutes of Health in 2015.
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