Do You Know What LGBT Means?

Believe it or not there are a number of people who do not. When I was an intern I tabled the non-profits table at a convention that is sponsored by a local NBC on health and wellness. When people asked what our organization did, I said “We are a LGBT family and youth service agency” and I got blank stares and they asked “what is LGBT?” It was then that I realized that we were living in our own little world and that many straight people didn’t have a clue about LGBT meant.

Flash forward three years and now I am on a committee that wants to write guideline for LGBT Elders in nursing homes and senior centers, now I realize that we have to assume that the staff that we want to training will know nothing about “LGBT” so we will have to cover the most basic information, LGBT 101.

I have been reading a number of surveys and research article on the topic of LGBT healthcare and eldercare. A report that I’m reading now is “POLICY FOCUS Asking Patients Questions about Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity in Clinical Settings” by the Fenway Institute and they take the same basic approach. One of the topics that they discuss in intake forms at clinics, you know the ones with box you check off; male, female. This is what they recommend…

What is your current gender identity?
(Check all that apply)
 Male
 Female
 Female-to-Male (FTM)/Transgender
Male/Trans Man
 Male-to-Female (MTF)/Transgender
Female/Trans Woman
 Genderqueer, neither exclusively male nor female
 Additional Gender Category/(or Other),
please specify
 Decline to Answer, please explain why
What sex were you assigned at birth on
your original birth certificate?
(Check one)
 Male
 Female
 Decline to Answer, please explain why

They found that,

Only 1% declined to answer the current gender identity question, while another 1% chose “other”; the other 98% choose from among the gender identity options. Three percent declined to answer the question, “What sex were you assigned on your original birth certificate?”, while 97% did answer this question.

Seventy-nine percent of all respondents strongly agreed that they understood all the choices in the gender identity question, while only 7% strongly disagreed. Heterosexual respondents were more likely than gay, lesbian, and bisexual respondents to say they did not understand all the choices of responses in the gender identity question. Eighty-five percent strongly agreed that they would answer the birth sex question, and 78% strongly agreed that they would answer the current gender identity question.

I think that bears out my observation where not all straight people know what we mean when we say “male to female” or any other terms that we use within the community. While some trans-women don’t like to be asked those questions,

Close to 84% of male and female non-transgender respondents agreed that they would answer the gender identity question on a registration form at their health center (Table 4). Among transgender men, 87% agreed, while 81% of transgender women agreed.

Their conclusion is,

This survey of a diverse group of patients in four health centers finds that most patients understand the importance of asking about sexual orientation and gender identity and would be willing to answer a set of existing questions developed to collect SOGI data in health care settings. We believe that health care providers and regulatory bodies should move forward by taking steps to facilitate SOGI data collection in clinical settings and in EHRs.

This is important because it could very well mean life or death. The doctors should know beforehand what they will find when they cut us open or treat us for an illness. There shouldn’t be any surprises on the operating table.