Gender Minority Stress and Health Perceptions Among Transgender Individuals in a Small Metropolitan Southeastern Region of the United States

Purpose: Transgender individuals continue to face wide-ranging health disparities, which may be due in part to unique and chronic gender identity-related stressors. The present study assessed the relationships between barriers to health care, proximal minority stress related to perceived community safety, and overall health perceptions of transgender individuals living in a small metropolitan region of the Southern United States. Methods: Participants included 66 transgender individuals who took part in a larger lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) community needs assessment study. Participants completed measures of barriers to health care, inclusive of medical access barriers, psychosocial needs barriers, and personal resource barriers, perceptions of LGBTQ safety within the region, and overall perceptions of health. Results: Results revealed that psychosocial needs barriers, personal needs barriers, and perceived lack of community safety were correlated with poorer self-perceptions of overall health, with psychosocial needs barriers and perceived lack of community safety independently predictive of poor health perceptions. Conclusions: The study demonstrates the need for greater health resources and access to care, as well as improved community conditions for transgender individuals, particularly those in less populated, Southern regions of the United States, to improve health quality and ultimately reduce community health disparities.