Identifying Health Differences Between Transgender and Cisgender Gay, Bisexual and Other Men Who Have Sex With Men Using a Community-Based Approach

ABSTRACT

In this article, we describe a community-based research (CBR) approach to making a national online survey of gay, bisexual, and other men who have sex with men (GBMSM) inclusive of transgender GBMSM by working with members of the transgender community at all stages of the research process. This collaboration resulted in 209 transgender GBMSM completing our survey and we contrasted their health experiences with 7439 cisgender GBMSM. We found that transgender GBMSM were less likely than cisgender GBMSM to report intercourse without a condom (AOR 0.43; 95% CI: 0.28–0.66) and to have had an HIV test (AOR 0.64; 95% CI 0.49–0.85). Transgender GBMSM were more likely to report discrimination in the health care system in their lifetime (AOR 4.17; 95% CI 3.03–5.73), to self-rate their health as poor (AOR 3.47; 95% CI 2.52–4.80), and to have discussed depression (AOR 3.47; 95% CI 262–4.59) or anxiety (AOR 3.27; 95% CI 2.47–4.33) with a health care provider. Our experience highlights the feasibility of including transgender individuals in GBMSM research, while the results affirm the need for GBMSM health services to take into account the unique experiences of transgender GBMSM.

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank Dr. Terry Trussler and Dr. Rick Marchand for their leadership with the Sex Now Survey. Thank you to Chase Ross for his promotion efforts on his YouTube channel. Thank you as well to the investigaytors who helped with all stages of the project. Finally, we would like to thank all the cisgender and transgender men who took the time to complete the survey and as such helped to strengthen GBMSM’s health in Canada.

Notes

¹ In the context of this paper, transgender refers to those for whom their sex assigned at birth is partially or fully incongruent with gender identity while cisgender refer to those for whom their gender identity corresponds to their sex at birth.

Additional information

Funding

The Sex Now Survey 2015 was possible thanks to a grant from the Vancouver Foundation. Post-doctoral funding for OF was provided by the Michael Smith Foundation for Health Research. RK is supported by a Scholar Award from MSFHR. AJR is supported by a Canadian Institutes of Health Research Doctoral Research Award. AS is supported by a Canadian Institutes of Health Research Fellowship.