NYC Unveils LGBTQ Health Care Bill Of Rights

GREENWICH VILLAGE, NY — The city unveiled a new LGBTQ Health Care Bill of Rights on Tuesday as part of a broader effort to inform gay, bisexual and gender-nonconforming New Yorkers of their legal right to nondiscriminatory healthcare.

City health officials announced the new bill of rights along with a new ad campaign that will encourage LGBTQ New Yorkers to see doctors who treat them with dignity and respect. The "Bare It All" campaign will be unrolled throughout the city, and encourage LGBTQ city residents to speak openly with their doctors, and to seek medical treatment elsewhere if their doctors make them feel judged. The new initiatives were announced on Tuesday afternoon at The Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Community Center, the longtime pillar of the gay rights movement in Greenwich Village.

Surveys and studies have shown that some LGBTQ patients may be less likely to seek treatment because of stigma or because of discriminatory treatment from healthcare professions. In a survey in 2009, the nonprofit Lambda Legal surveyed almost 5,000 LGBT people and people with HIV, finding repeated reports of barriers to healthcare for those patients. Among the survey respondents living with HIV, 36 percent reported that health care professionals refused to touch them or used excessive precautions when doing so, according to Lambda Legal.

The city's new bill of rights stipulates specific ways in which LGBTQ patients must be treated with dignity by their doctors or other health care professionals. For instance, the bill of rights notes that transgender patients have the right to be addressed by their self-identified name and gender, both verbally and on medical forms.

Part of the campaign is a new "NYC Health Map" that identifies LGBTQ-knowledgeable providers throughout the city.

The "Bare It All" campaign will appear on the subway and at MTA bus stations, and will feature city health official Dr. Demetre Daskalakis, the city said.

"As an openly gay man and a leader in health in New York City, you would expect that my physician would have made me feel comfortable about discussing my life," Daskalakis said in a statement. "When that didn't happen, I had to find a physician that made me feel confident in sharing my personal details. Since then, my care has become better and more complete now that I have a doctor with an awareness of who I am and how I can achieve my best possible health."

The NYC Health Map can be found here, and the LGBTQ Bill of Rights is available here. (For more Greenwich Village and NYC news, subscribe here for free news alerts from Patch.)

Lead image via NYC Department of Health.