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Hello all:
I am a nursing faculty doing a doctoral thesis on the concept of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) biases in obstetric nursing curricula. As an OB/GYN nurse/faculty for 22 years, I have had the opportunity to deal with many families from different cultures and subcultures. I have observed that one of the subcultures that nursing professionals struggle to provide competent care to, is the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender population. The nursing professionals still have many myths and misconceptions about this population. I hope that my study will help not only the nursing community but also the academic community. I am not a not a member of this population, but I am a strong supporter of their plights and their issues.
When I became a nurse, I realized that my colleagues need a lot of education about this population. Whenever we get a patient from the homosexuality population, there will be jokes, taunts, and even angry comments from my colleagues.
One day, a Lesbian patient had a stillbirth. The OB staff was not supportive of this woman. She was not allowed to have her partner at the bedside during the delivery. I even overheard a senior staff nurse said to the hearing of the patient, "God took that baby away because it is not right for that woman to be doing what she is doing". I was angry and in shock.
As an educator, I realized that the reason for this type of attitudes towards the homosexuality population is due to lack of knowledge. This is a problem since the profession claim to be a caring profession that caters to all individuals notwithstanding their race, culture, age, sexual orientation, etc. With the ongoing debate in the media about same gender marriage, this topic is very relevant for social change. I believe that this problem stems from lack of education and knowledge by the nursing professionals. I want to investigate the concept of homosexuality biases in obstetric nursing curriculum.
Do you think that this study is feasible? Do you have any suggestions for me?