Health
- Research
All forms of gender affirmation were positively associated with the wellbeing of trans young people. Though young people who had socially affirmed their gender faced higher likelihoods of experiencing verbal harassment and homelessness, this is likely linked to their increased visibility and subsequent vulnerability to discrimination. These findings highlight the need for targeted interventions to address transphobia and discrimination. A comprehensive approach to supporting the wellbeing of trans young people should include legal, medical, and social affirmation, as well as addressing potential negative outcomes via societal education.
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Women experiencing homelessness may face barriers to access reproductive healthcare. This quality improvement (QI) initiative sought to examine perceived barriers to STI prevention and opportunities for expanding STI prevention services and education for women experiencing homelessness.
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Co-production of palliative care research with people with lived experience of homelessness is essential, but must be done carefully and sensitively. As a population with high levels of premature morbidity and mortality yet low access to palliative care, the TIFFIN recommendations could help to support the involvement of people with lived experience of homelessness in palliative and end-of-life-care care research.
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Health care providers and systems should leverage their political power to advocate for policies that scale durable, evidence-based solutions to reduce homelessness, including increased funding to expand housing choice vouchers and greater investment in the creation and preservation of affordable housing.
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This study sought to describe and explore associations among selected determinants of health and self-reported scores on indicators of psychological capital among youth experiencing homelessness.
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In this issue of CMAJ, Alston and colleagues describe the urgent and complex problem of homelessness among older adults, a growing population nationwide.
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Urban poverty and homelessness keep growing while investments in health-promoting services and public infrastructure, including drinking water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) have been decreasing. We used a mixed-method approach to collect data from 45 unhoused individuals in Germany identifying individual, infrastructure-specific, and location-based solutions to improve public WASH. Suggestions included adapting existing infrastructure, opening up existing, but inaccessible and constructing new inclusive infrastructure. Proactive, long-term sustainable solutions were preferred over reactive short-time options. Realizing safe WASH for all requires collaboration between homeless communities, governmental bodies, NGOs, businesses, and sanitation experts.
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Emergency shelters offer temporary sleeping accommodation to people deprived of housing and connect them to services. Service restriction is the practice of limiting or denying someone access to emergency shelters. This parallel convergent mixed methods study describes the characteristics, healthcare utilization, and morbidity of people experiencing service restrictions in Hamilton, Ontario, and explores the relationship between health and service restriction. Participants’ high healthcare need and utilization was shaped by criminalization, stigma, societal abandonment, and abstinence-based substance use policies.
