Transgender People, HIV and Access to Care:

A half to full-day training for health and human service providers

Time: 3-6 hours, special skills-building focus emphasis is adapted depending on specific contracting audience needs.

Audience: All social service and medical providers, including counselors, program planners, case managers and nurses.

AV Needs: LCD Projector, flip chart, markers, masking tape

Description of course:

Transgender (TG) people face a daunting range of societal issues that influence barriers in receiving adequate, helpful, appropriate care. Well-meaning providers are often unsure or uncomfortable asking basic questions about care. At the same time, the impact of HIV on gender variant people is painfully high. This one-day training will provide basic information about transgender issues and help build skills for staff and agencies needing to work more effectively with transgender folks.

Training Goal:

To examine specific health care and HIV prevention and treatment needs of transgender people and to build skills for human service providers to be able to work more effectively with members of this community.

Learning Objectives:

1. Provide overview of terms and concepts to understand transgender people's lives and experiences.
2. Identify distinctions between gender identity and sexual orientation and importance of these differences in reaching transgender clients.
3. Examine HIV prevalence, and issues of HIV risks and risk reduction for transgender clients.
4. Examine barriers in health care delivery systems for transgender patients, identifying at least three specific barriers to HIV treatment and primary care.
5. Understand and assess solutions to providing services and care in participants' agencies or work, identifying at least three specific strategies for improvement.