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CAPITAL REGION
LGBT patients seeking respect
Initiative collecting health care stories
BY KATHLEEN MOORE Gazette Reporter

    A Schenectady psychiatrist once looked at Kate Terrell and assumed she was there for a “sexual problem.”
    He saw a man, dressed as a woman. Why else would she be coming to him?
    It didn’t occur to him that Terrell was simply suffering from grief over her mother’s death — an issue wholly unrelated to the fact that she is also transgender.
    Terrell ended up having to explain when she knew she was transgender — “at birth” — before she could talk about her grief.
    It’s awkward moments like this that led a Schenectady group to begin gathering LGBT health care stories. The Rainbow Access Initiative, run by a social worker, hopes to teach health care workers how to better care for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender patients.
    RAI offers training on sexuality and gender development, domestic violence, and a host of other topics that might be handled differently if they involve someone who is not heterosexual.
    For hospital workers, one of the newest challenges is developing policies for transgender patients. Hospitals are struggling to handle basic problems, from room assignments to ID bracelets.
    Should a transgender patient be placed with male or female roommates? How do nurses broach the topic of gender, which must be filled out correctly on insurance forms to avoid automatic denials?
    RAI estimates that there are 2,500 transgender residents in the Capital Region, based on a nationwide study by the Williams Institute.
    Terrell, a Schenectadian, was one of the first transgender residents to submit a health care story to RAI for its training program. Her main point: if her illness has nothing to do with her gender, accept her as a woman and focus on the illness.
    She has been to many doctors for cardiac problems, so she summed up her advice in that vein. “I’m there for my heart, not for how I’m dressing,” she said. “If they’re not there for a transgender issue — don’t bring it up!”
M FOR MALE
    She’s found that some health care workers are far more willing to do that than others.
    On one hospital visit, a nurse insisted on looking at her genitals and then switched her ID bracelet to one labeled M for male.
    Switching a bracelet might sound like a small thing to someone who has never worried about their gender. But to someone who spent years coming to the conclusion that her gender was at odds with her physical body, it was a slap in the face.
    She felt like the hospital was proclaiming her physical gender to everyone.
    “Every single doctor, every technician, every orderly that walked into my room, knew I’m not a normal woman,” she said. “I go through great pains to appear female. Because I am. I was born with the wrong parts, but that doesn’t mean I’m any less female than you are.”
    Terrell has the physical genitalia of a man, but she is certain she’s a woman. However, she can’t take estrogen because of childhood heart problems. Her doctors have told her she’ll never be able to undergo gender reassignment surgery, which means she won’t ever become a woman in the way that many health professionals defi ne it.
    Because she can’t change her body, she’s hoping health care professionals will become more willing to change.
    Locally, hospitals are adapting.
    Leaders at Ellis Hospital plan to meet with RAI next month to work on the issue.
    “We are committed to meeting the health care needs of all of our patients, and in doing so we take into account each patient’s individual needs,” spokeswoman Donna Evans said. “We are looking forward to working with Rainbow Access Initiative to discuss some of the health care issues faced by the LGBT community and how together we can better address those needs by enhancing the culturally sensitive care we provide.”
POLICY REVISIONS
    At Albany Medical Center Hospital, offi cials first wrote a policy for transgender patients in 2003. They’ve changed it several times since then as problems have surfaced and new solutions were created.
    Among the policies: transgender patients will be placed in a single room, if one is available. If it’s not, they will be placed with a roommate of the gender that they identify as theirs.
    That’s a relief to Terrell, who once had to tell nurses that she didn’t feel safe in a room with a male patient.
    “With my pink pajama pants and my Tinkerbell shirt, putting me in with a man is less safe for me,” she said.
    Albany Med spokeswoman Sue Ford said workers have also been given sensitivity training, particularly to learn that the topic of gender can be a minefi eld.
    Nurses are taught, for example, to carefully broach the topic.
    “In hopes of helping them with their billing, to reduce any denials due to incorrect name or gender, we would ask what their health insurance has on file,” Ford said. .......................>>>>.....................>>>>...............http://www.dailygazette.net/De.....r00102&AppName=1

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Switching a bracelet might sound like a small thing to someone who has never worried about their gender. But to someone who spent years coming to the conclusion that her gender was at odds with her physical body, it was a slap in the face.
    She felt like the hospital was proclaiming her physical gender to everyone.
    “Every single doctor, every technician, every orderly that walked into my room, knew I’m not a normal woman,” she said. “I go through great pains to appear female. Because I am. I was born with the wrong parts, but that doesn’t mean I’m any less female than you are.”
    Terrell has the physical genitalia of a man, but she is certain she’s a woman. However, she can’t take estrogen because of childhood heart problems. Her doctors have told her she’ll never be able to undergo gender reassignment surgery, which means she won’t ever become a woman in the way that many health professionals defi ne it.

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  For hospital workers, one of the newest challenges is developing policies for transgender patients. Hospitals are struggling to handle basic problems, from room assignments to ID bracelets.

“We are looking forward to working with Rainbow Access Initiative to discuss some of the health care issues faced by the LGBT community and how together we can better address those needs by enhancing the culturally sensitive care we provide.”

Quoted from CICERO

  

Wouldn't developing policies specific for transgender patients be discriminatory?