Researcher at Drexel University Zeroes in on Health Services and Policy (State-level heterogeneity in associations between structural stigma and individual healthcare access: A multilevel analysis of transgender adults in the United States): Health and Medicine – Health Services and Policy

2022 SEP 09 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- Investigators publish new report on health services and policy. According to news reporting from Drexel University by NewsRx journalists, research stated, “State-level variation in how restrictive policies affect health care access for transgender populations has not been widely studied. Therefore, we assessed the association between structural stigma and four measures of individual health care access among transgender people in the United States, and the extent to which structural stigma explains state-level variability.”

Our news correspondents obtained a quote from the research from Drexel University: “Data were drawn from the 2015-2019 Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System and the Human Rights Campaign’s State Equality Index. We calculated weighted proportions and conducted multilevel logistic regression of individual heterogeneity and discriminatory accuracy. An increase in the structural stigma score by one standard deviation was associated with lower odds of health care coverage (OR = 0.80; 95% CI: 0.66, 0.96) after adjusting for individual-level confounders. Approximately 11% of the total variance for insurance coverage was attributable to the state level; however, only 18% of state-level variability was explained by structural stigma. Adding Medicaid expansion attenuated the structural stigma-insurance association and explained 22% of state-level variation in health insurance. For the remaining outcomes (usual source of care, routine medical check-up, and cost-related barriers), we found neither meaningful associations nor considerable between-state variability.”

According to the news reporters, the research concluded: “Our findings support the importance of Medicaid expansion and transgender-inclusive antidiscrimination protections to enhance health care insurance coverage. From a measurement perspective, however, additional research is needed to develop and validate measures of transgender-specific structural stigma to guide future policy interventions.”

For more information on this research see: State-level heterogeneity in associations between structural stigma and individual healthcare access: A multilevel analysis of transgender adults in the United States. Journal of Health Services Research & Policy, 2022. The publisher for Journal of Health Services Research & Policy is SAGE Publications.

A free version of this journal article is available at https://doi.org/10.1177/13558196221123413.

Our news editors report that more information may be obtained by contacting Nguyen K Tran, Doctoral Fellow, Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Drexel University, United States. Additional authors for this research include Kellan E Baker, Elle Lett, Ayden I Scheim.

ORCID is an identifier for authors and includes bibliographic information. The following is ORCID information for the authors of this research: Nguyen K Tran (http://orcid.org/0000-0002-5093-4499), Elle Lett (http://orcid.org/0000-0002-6590-7821).

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