Dismissed by Angela Marshall

Author:Angela Marshall
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Citadel Press
Published: 2022-12-15T00:00:00+00:00

Implicit bias can emerge in our interaction with transgender people, even for those of us who are conscious of our bias issues and working to keep them separate from our behavior. I recently viewed a medical lecture given by Dr. Kimberly Manning, a diversity and inclusion expert. Dr. Manning tells of a patient visit at a primary care clinic, part of a “safety net” hospital that did not require insurance. A new patient had just arrived in the area and needed to establish a primary care doctor to get her medications refilled. Seeing that the prescriptions were for gender-affirming hormones, Dr. Manning told the new patient that she didn’t feel qualified to refill them herself but could refer the patient to endocrinologists. Those providers would require health insurance, unlike the clinic.

The new patient challenged her: “Do you tell your patients with hyperthyroidism that you don’t know enough about it? Is that what you do when you encounter something new? What would you do with a patient who did not have insurance?” The patient got up to leave, having faced such discouraging treatment before. Dr. Manning then realized that by referring away this patient she would be abandoning her goal of patient-focused care. Her definition of primary care had been too narrow. She made the calls she needed to educate herself on how to care for this patient. From then on, she would include transgender patients with all the other unique individuals in her care. This is a model we should all strive toward—being able to recognize our bias and self-correct for the benefit of our patients. I greatly appreciate Dr. Manning for allowing herself to be vulnerable enough to share that compelling story. I have also since undergone cultural bias training around transgender patients in order to better understand their life lens so that I will be prepared for my future patients.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.