To examine if trans and gender non-conforming participants perceive greater healthcare inequities in their interactions with healthcare practitioners than cisgender sexual minority participants, and analyse free text responses from transgender and gender non-conforming participants to gain possible insight into causes of inequities.
A cross-sectional study.
An anonymous online survey of over 2800 self-selecting LGBTQI+ participants, 30% of whom identified as trans and gender non-conforming. The research team devised closed and open-ended questions about perceptions of healthcare provision and analysed quantitative responses using SPSS and open-ended data through thematic analysis.
Over half of trans and gender non-conforming participants reported having had occasion to educate healthcare professionals about LGBTQI+ identities and a majority reported that healthcare professionals made incorrect assumptions about their LGBTQI+ identity. Invalidation and pathologisation of participants' trans and gender non-conforming identity and unhelpful therapeutic approaches were some of the negative health experiences cited.
Trans and gender non-conforming populations experience significant barriers to healthcare relative to their cisgender sexual minority peers. Cisnormative thinking in healthcare practice together with a lack of knowledge of trans and gender non-conforming people's experiences leads to substandard care and acts as a barrier to disclosure and help seeking.
Culturally responsive healthcare is critical to ending health inequities experienced by trans and gender non-conforming people.
Problem addressed: Healthcare inequities among trans and gender non-conforming participants.
Main findings: Trans and gender non-conforming participants reported more negative perceptions of their healthcare experiences compared to cisgender sexual minority participants.
Where and on whom will the research have an impact? Healthcare educators/practitioners.
Strobe.
Members of the LGBTQI+ community were part of the research advisory group and inputted into paper authorship.
Highlights the need for training to increase cultural competency among healthcare providers.
It is unclear whether routine testing of women for group B streptococcus (GBS) colonisation either in late pregnancy or during labour reduces early-onset neonatal sepsis, compared with a risk factor-based strategy.
Cluster randomised trial.
320 000 women from up to 80 hospital maternity units.
Sites will be randomised 1:1 to a routine testing strategy or the risk factor-based strategy, using a web-based minimisation algorithm. A second-level randomisation allocates routine testing sites to either antenatal enriched culture medium testing or intrapartum rapid testing. Intrapartum antibiotic prophylaxis will be offered if a test is positive for GBS, or if a maternal risk factor for early-onset GBS infection in her baby is identified before or during labour. Economic and acceptability evaluations will be embedded within the trial design.
The primary outcome is all-cause early (
The trial received a favourable opinion from Derby Research Ethics Committee on 16 September 2019 (19/EM/0253). The allocated testing strategy will be adopted as standard clinical practice by the site. Women in the routine testing sites will give verbal consent for the test. The trial will use routinely collected data retrieved from National Health Service databases, supplemented with limited participant-level collection of process outcomes. Individual written consent will not be sought. The trial results, and parallel economic, qualitative, implementation and methodological results, will be published in the journal Health Technology Assessment.