Removing Barriers to Health for Lesbian and Bisexual Women

This talk, Removing Barriers to Health for Lesbian and Bisexual Women will analyze barriers to the realization of good health for lesbian and bisexual women and identify and assess multiple means of removing or lowering those barriers. The discussion of barriers will take a whole systems approach, and will explore stigma, discrimination and resulting stresses that affect mental and physical health; negative behaviors that may be a response to stress and that may be strengthened by community norms, including smoking, alcohol abuse and obesity; lesbian and bisexual women's experiencesin the health care system and structural factors that lead to avoidence of healthcare; and barriers particular to bisexual women's health. The second half of the talk will explore solutions to these barriers: these will include areas of necessary research; the importance of training in culturally competent care; social support and the re-envisioning of norms within the lesbian/bisexual community; and responses possible in law and public policy.