State-Level Policy Stigma and Non-Prescribed Hormones Use among Trans Populations in the United States : A Mediational Analysis of Insurance and Anticipated Stigma

Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Society of Behavioral Medicine 2021..

BACKGROUND: Medical gender affirmation (i.e., hormone use) is one-way transgender (trans) people affirm their gender and has been associated with health benefits. However, trans people face stigmatization when accessing gender-affirming healthcare, which leads some to use non-prescribed hormones (NPHs) that increase their risk for poor health.

PURPOSE: We examined whether healthcare policy stigma, as measured by state-level trans-specific policies, was associated with NPHs use and tested mediational paths that might explain these associations. Because stigmatizing healthcare policies prevent trans people from participation in healthcare systems and allow for discrimination by healthcare providers, we hypothesized that healthcare policy stigma would be associated with NPHs use by operating through three main pathways: skipping care due to anticipated stigma in healthcare settings, skipping care due to cost, and being uninsured.

METHODS: We conducted analyses using data from the 2015 U.S. Transgender Survey. The analytic sample included trans adults using hormones (N = 11,994). We fit a multinomial structural equation model to examine associations.

RESULTS: Among trans adults using hormones, we found that healthcare policy stigma was positively associated with NPHs use and operated through insurance coverage and anticipating stigma in healthcare settings. The effect sizes on key predictor variables varied significantly between those who use supplemental NPHs and those who only use NPHs suggesting the need to treat NPHs use as distinct from those who use supplemental NPHs.

CONCLUSIONS: Our work highlights the importance of healthcare policy stigma in understanding health inequities among trans people in the USA, specifically NPHs use.

Medienart:

E-Artikel

Erscheinungsjahr:

2022

Erschienen:

2022

Enthalten in:

Zur Gesamtaufnahme - volume:56

Enthalten in:

Annals of behavioral medicine : a publication of the Society of Behavioral Medicine - 56(2022), 6 vom: 29. Juni, Seite 592-604

Sprache:

Englisch

Beteiligte Personen:

Hughes, Landon D [VerfasserIn]
Gamarel, Kristi E [VerfasserIn]
King, Wesley M [VerfasserIn]
Goldenberg, Tamar [VerfasserIn]
Jaccard, James [VerfasserIn]
Geronimus, Arline T [VerfasserIn]

Links:

Volltext

Themen:

Gender affirmation
Hormone use
Hormones
Insurance
Journal Article
Policy
Research Support, N.I.H., Extramural
Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
Structural stigma
Transgender

Anmerkungen:

Date Completed 01.07.2022

Date Revised 27.10.2023

published: Print

Citation Status MEDLINE

doi:

10.1093/abm/kaab063

funding:

Förderinstitution / Projekttitel:

PPN (Katalog-ID):

NLM329343262