Reducing Health Disparities Among LGBTQ Populations Through Culturally Competent Care

Individuals who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, or queer/questioning (LGBTQ) experience worse health outcomes than their heterosexual counterparts. In recognition of LGBTQ Pride Month, on June 2 at 12 p.m. ET, in a webinar sponsored by Mathematica’s LGBTQ+ Employee Resource Group and its LGBTQ Affinity Group, Perry N. Halkitis, a public health psychologist, researcher, educator, and advocate, discussed how clinicians can use culturally competent care to reduce the health disparities that LGBTQ individuals face.

Halkitis is dean and professor of biostatistics and urban public health at the Rutgers School of Public Health. His research examines the intersection between the HIV epidemic, drug abuse, and mental health burden, and the biological, behavioral, psychosocial, and structural factors that predispose the LGBTQ population to these and other health disparities. He founded and directs the Center for Health, Identity, Behavior and Prevention Studies, which partners with community agencies to conduct studies for and with the LGBTQ population, including four current studies funded by the National Institutes of Health for which he is an investigator.

His book, The AIDS Generation: Stories of Survival and Resilience, which examines the strategies for survival and coping employed by HIV-positive gay men in the 1980s and early 1990s, was the recipient of the American Psychological Association Distinguished Book Award in LGBT Psychology. In 2019, he released a new book, Out in Time, which explores the life experiences of three generations of gay men: Stonewall, AIDS, and Queer generations.