Prominent Medical Practitioners Who Identify as LGBTQ

Recent research reports suggest that finding doctors competent to care for LGBTQ patients is becoming increasingly more difficult. It is therefore worth looking at the presence of LGBTQ medical practitioners who have made, or are making, an important contribution to this professional field.

Whereas LGBTQ individuals may suffer the same medical conditions as society as a whole, it is known that their outcomes are worse. A large part of this is because few doctors identify themselves as knowledgeable about the community and culturally competent, and few hospitals have programs to train staff about the unique characteristics of the community. It is only in recent years that professional medical associations began accepting and recognizing LGBTQ physicians. Thirty percent of LGBTQ medical students still hide their sexual identity during medical school based on their fear of discrimination.

In this environment, having LGBTQ mentors and role models plays an important role. There is representation of these individuals, but knowledge about them is scarce or non-existent. Some examples of outstanding role models include:

the first practicing women physician in Scotland was lesbian Margaret Todd;
the first practicing women physician in Queensland, Australia was lesbian Lilian Violet Cooper;
the world's first transgender President of a medical staff at a hospital is Canadian Carys Massarella;
physician Tom Waddell founded the Gay Games;

Australia

Cameroon