Los Angeles, CA Transgender Community Health Clinic Campaign

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C3@ftmalliance.org

Community Clinic Campaign Documentary

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Too few transgender people have access to basic, culturally competent health care.  This lack of access leads to on-going, preventable health care problems for community members and their families.  For some people it can prevent or delay them from transitioning.  For others, it can mean that basic health maintenance issues (high blood pressure, for instance) go untreated.  And for too many it can lead to accessing medication and advice through the street economy.  These deficits in health care are part of the way oppression has prevented transgender people from organizing for our own needs.

LA County lacks any low-cost health clinics that provide basic and gender-specific care for transgender adults.  Unlike Los Angeles, San Francisco and San Diego counties have regularly scheduled, transgender-specific health care clinics.

The Tom Waddell Clinic in San Francisco is a county-operated once-a-week clinic providing primary health care to thousands of transgender people each year.  In 2003, the Family Health Center of San Diego expanded their regularly scheduled gay male health clinic to include transgender people.

Both of these clinics provide free and sliding scale services.  They are both specialty clinics housed within fully functioning, pre-existing clinics.  In addition, Santa Cruz recently initiated a health access project through their Planned Parenthood Health Clinic.

Instead of having a designated night, Planned Parenthood has identified a designated provider on their staff who can be accessed by any transgender community member.

Using these clinics as examples of innovative responses to the lack of accessible health care, this project focusses on replicating their success in strategic locations throughout Los Angeles County.

This Campaign is changing the health care infrastructure to improve the health and wellbeing of transgender people and their families throughout Los Angeles County.  This infrastructure will reduce the ill-effects that occur when some people are not able to transition (depression, anxiety, etc), provide culturally appropriate access to on-going basic health care, and allow service providers the opportunity to work one-on-one with patients to reduce their risk for health-related societal problems (HIV transmission, substance abuse, etc).