Fenway Health is conducting a new study on gender-affirmative health care starting this November. This innovative study, titled “Transgender cohort study of gender affirmation and HIV-related health,” will enroll 4,500 transgender adult patients from Fenway Health and Callen-Lorde Community Health Center in New York, NY.
The study has three main goals:
1) Evaluate how medical gender affirmation intervention in a primary care setting affects the outcomes of HIV prevention and care;
2) Examine whether medical gender affirmation in a primary care setting results in marked improvements in the emotional well-being and health-related quality of life in transgender patients who are starting hormone therapy; look at whether these improvements also affect HIV-related outcomes; and
3) Measure at patient satisfaction with the medical gender affirmation received, discuss the patients’ future desires for and unmet medical gender affirmation needs, and identify the barriers to and facilitators of medical gender affirmation.
Participants will take part in the study throughout a 12 month period. Each participant will be asked to complete surveys three times over the course of the study, undergo HIV and STI testing at the beginning and end of the study, and will have de-identified information extracted from their patient record every three months. Personal identities will NOT be associated with this data, in order to protect patient privacy.
Want to receive email updates about what’s happening at Fenway Health? Sign up here.