Bodies and Barriers

About this book

Summary:"LGBT people pervasively experience health disparities, affecting every part of their bodies and lives. Yet many are still grappling to understand the mutually reinforcing health care challenges that lead LGBT people to experience worsened health outcomes. Bodies and Barriers informs health care professionals, students in health professions, policymakers, and fellow activists about these challenges, providing insights and a road map for action that could improve queer health. Through artfully articulated, data-informed essays by twenty-six well-known and emerging queer activists-including Alisa Bowman, Jack Harrison-Quintana, Liz Margolies, Robyn Ochs, Sean Strub, Justin Tanis, Ryan Thoreson, Imani Woody, and more-Bodies and Barriers illuminates the ubiquitous health challenges LGBT people experience throughout their lives. The book challenges conventional wisdom about health care delivery. It probes deeply into the roots of the health disparities and worsened health outcomes that the LGBT community face and empowers activists with crucial information to fight for health equity through clinical, behavioral, and policy changes. The activist contributors in Bodies and Barriers look for tangible improvements-their stories are lessons learned for caring health care professionals, sympathetic policymakers, and motivated activists-drawing lessons from the history of HIV/AIDS in America and from struggles against health care bias and discrimination. At a galvanizing moment when LGBT people have experienced great strides in lived equality, but our health as a community still lags, here is an indispensable blueprint for change by some of the most passionate and important health activists in the LGBT movement today. LGBT people pervasively experience health disparities, affecting every part of their bodies and lives. Yet many are still grappling to understand the mutually reinforcing health care challenges that lead LGBT people to experience worsened health outcomes. Bodies and Barriers informs health care professionals, students in health professions, policymakers, and fellow activists about these challenges, providing insights and a road map for action that could improve queer health. Through artfully articulated, data-informed essays by twenty-six well-known and emerging queer activists-including Alisa Bowman, Jack Harrison-Quintana, Liz Margolies, Robyn Ochs, Sean Strub, Justin Tanis, Ryan Thoreson, Imani Woody, and more-Bodies and Barriers illuminates the ubiquitous health challenges LGBT people experience throughout their lives. The book challenges conventional wisdom about health care delivery. It probes deeply into the roots of the health disparities and worsened health outcomes that the LGBT community face and empowers activists with crucial information to fight for health equity through clinical, behavioral, and policy changes. The activist contributors in Bodies and Barriers look for tangible improvements-their stories are lessons learned for caring health care professionals, sympathetic policymakers, and motivated activists-drawing lessons from the history of HIV/AIDS in America and from struggles against health care bias and discrimination. At a galvanizing moment when LGBT people have experienced great strides in lived equality, but our health as a community still lags, here is an indispensable blueprint for change by some of the most passionate and important health activists in the LGBT movement today"-- Provided by publisher