NIH Grant To Fund Game-based Curriculum On Transgender Health Equity

Loyola is one of six co-recipients of a $51 million federal grant from the National Institutes of Health for research on transgender health equity.

The grant was awarded to the Institute for Translational Medicine, an alliance between The University of Chicago and Rush University Medical Center, in collaboration with Loyola, Advocate Aurora Health, The Illinois Institute of Technology and Northshore University Health System, according to their website.

Loyola’s $646,000 share of the grant will go to the Marcella Niehoff School of Nursing to develop the “Trans*forming Care” program — an online mobile-app curriculum on transgender healthcare, according to the NIH.

The Institute for Translational Medicine has partnered with the Chicago Department of Public Health, nonprofits and community members to improve health equity for the 9.5 million people in their network, according to their website.

Transgender people experience healthcare inequity at a disproportionate rate compared to cisgender people in America, according to the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists. 

Transgender patients report the lack of providers who are sufficiently knowledgeable on gender affirming healthcare is the biggest barrier they face in receiving proper medical treatment, according to a 2017 NIH study. 

Over 1.6 million people in the United States identify as transgender, according to a report from UCLA’s Williams Institute, a think tank dedicated to research on sexual orientation, gender identity and public policy.

Lindsey Garfield, associate professor in the School of Nursing and co-principal investigator on the Trans*forming Care grant project, said the research will ultimately improve patient care through its positive impact on the education of nursing students. 

“In order to provide the best patient care, healthcare providers need to know what health topics are important for transgender patients,” Garfield said.“This project will develop a fun, engaging gaming app with a conglomeration of information based on organizational guidelines, expert opinion and patient perspective.”

A 2021 study published by the NIH found game-based curricula are an increasingly popular mode of education for future healthcare professionals. The study showed gamified learning can enhance the experiences of nursing students and increase motivation by meeting the demands of modern-day technology.

Dr. Dian Squire, associate dean for Inclusive Excellence and co-principal investigator of the Trans*forming Care Project, said the choice to present the content in a game format was made specifically to appeal to nursing students.

“We wanted to use the gamified app format so that users can jump in and out of the learning environment as their schedules allowed,” Squire said. “We are hoping that it is also a fun user experience so they’ll return to it regularly.” 

The app will be developed over the next four years, and will include seven asynchronous educational modules on topics ranging from legal restrictions on gender-inclusive care to potential drug interactions with hormone therapies.

The International Council of Nurses’ Code of Ethics for Nurses says nurses must be sensitive to the values of people without prejudice or unjust discrimination.

Many healthcare professionals are both unclear and inexperienced with treating the Transgender and Gender Diverse population, according to the Mayo Clinic.

“We’re providing evidence-based instruction to help nurses learn how to address the needs of a population that has long been overlooked by our health care system,” Dean Lorna Finnegan said in a Sept. 16 press release.

Finnegan said their work will be considerate of the realities transgender people face within the current healthcare system.

“Our work is unique because we’re incorporating the real-life experiences and perspectives of transgender and gender nonconforming individuals,” Finnegan said in the release.