Knowledge, Attitudes, and Beliefs of Medical Students Toward Transgender Healthcare: A Community-Driven Initiative

Introduction Transgender patients face substantial systemic healthcare barriers and inadequate care from providers who often demonstrate clinical gaps in the medical needs of the transgender community. Providing interventions in which affirming transgender healthcare is explored, is crucial to delivering competent transgender-patient care and building compassionate physician-patient relationships. The Northeast Pennsylvania (NEPA) Trans Health Conference was established to address the growing need for an educational forum where transgender people could voice their narratives. In this educational intervention study, changes in the knowledge, attitudes, and beliefs about the psychosocial and medical needs of the transgender community in first-year undergraduate medical students were examined pre- and post-trans health conference attendance. Materials and methods In the late spring of both 2018 and 2019, first-year medical students attended the NEPA Trans Health Conference, hosted by the Geisinger Commonwealth School of Medicine (GCSOM). Student knowledge, attitudes, and beliefs, regarding the healthcare needs of the transgender community were evaluated prior to and directly after the conference (intervention). Though the surveys shared thematic similarities, the 2018 and 2019 surveys were different and thus were not used comparatively. Results In 2018, 35.24% of first-year medical students (37/105 participants) completed both the pre- and post-survey. Overall, 62.5% (5/8) of survey items yielded significant differences. In 2019, 25.5%, of first-year medical students (28/110 participants) completed both the pre- and post-survey and 47.6% (9/21) of survey items yielded significant results. Overall, although the majority of first-year medical students displayed positive attitudes toward trans people pre-intervention, the students also demonstrated increased knowledge, empathy, and understanding of the transgender healthcare narrative post-intervention. Conclusion Providing medical students with a humanistic intervention within the medical curriculum that is focused on the transgender person, in addition to their past and present healthcare experiences, offers a bridge between academic content and providing inclusive gender-affirming healthcare to all patients.