“Sick of homosexuality”, controversy broke out over the doctor’s diagnosis

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“Current disease: homosexuality”. This is the diagnosis that appeared on a medical report drawn up by a gynecologist at the Reina Sofía public hospital in Murcia, southern Spain, to a 19-year-old woman who had a menstrual cycle disorder. The young woman’s mother told the online newspaper elDiario.es that the gynecologist had asked her daughter if she could include her sexual orientation in her relationship and that she had initially agreed, despite her surprise, as she thought that perhaps it might be somewhere. relevant way, not that his homosexuality would later be called the cause of the problem. “At first, I thought it was funny, but it’s not at all,” said the girl, who said she left the hospital in tears.

The complaint

Following the incident, the mother filed a formal complaint with the Murcia Health System against the doctor and asked that this information be removed from the certificate as deemed “vexatious”. Gaactyco, an LGBT + collective from Cartagena to which the girl had first contacted to understand what measures she could take, also joined the complaint. “It was 1990 when the World Health Organization removed homosexuality from the list of mental illnesses, yet 31 years later, in the Murcia health system, some professionals continue to view sexual orientation as a health problem”, attacked the association.

Case not isolated

Galactyco explained that there are “numerous cases of humiliating treatment that are reported to our Association due to sexual or gender orientation, claiming to consider” alarming, unacceptable and intolerable that to date the professionals on whom an adequate treatment of our health ignore the reality of LGBT + people “. For its part, the Murcia health authority has promised that “all necessary measures will be taken for detailed knowledge of the facts and the consequent adoption of appropriate measures”.