Why is this study important and how can it benefit the 2S/LGBTQQIA+ communities?

The study will provide essential information on what care 2S/LGBTQQIA+ individuals and communities are currently accessing and what gaps exist.

This project will have a number of impacts on 2S/LGBTQQIA+ communities, on sexual, reproductive, and gender-affirming health care providers, on health care systems broadly and on health research. This work directly responds to the 2019 HESA Report’s suggestion that digital health solutions are one opportunity to reduce barriers to sexual, reproductive, and gender-affirming health care access for 2S/LGBTQQIA+ communities. Given the unprecedented uptake of virtual care and other non-typical care offerings during the COVID-19 pandemic, this research will create new knowledge on novel strategies to address systemic barriers to health care access for 2S/LGBTQQIA+ people that have persisted for decades.

Findings from this project will help optimize a growing number of community-based approaches to care outside of typical clinical settings for sexual, reproductive, and gender-affirming health care. Because these initiatives are still quite new and limited in scope, there is an opportunity to inform their development and improve uptake and acceptability, informed by diverse 2S/LGBTQQIA+ community members’ needs, desires, challenges, and experiences. In particular, sexual, reproductive, and gender-affirming health care providers will benefit from the findings (of both their health care provider colleagues and 2S/LGBTQQIA+ community members), which in turn can support them in providing better, affirming care to 2S/LGBTQQIA+ communities.

While this project is specific to 2S/LGBTQQIA+ communities, the research findings will be beneficial to researchers, community-based organizations, policy makers and others whose work focuses on any community that has experienced barriers to accessing clinical sexual, reproductive, and gender-affirming health care – such as those living in rural or remote communities, Indigenous communities (on reserve and in urban settings), disabled individuals, individuals who reside within institutional settings, and individuals with chronic health conditions (including those with serious mental health challenges) that reduce their capacity to attend typical clinic settings.