Imagining Just Healthcare: A Feminist Approach to Data-driven Lessons From a Community Centred Method to Enhance and Enable Healthcare Access for Marginalised LGBT+ People

Abstract

Our project is a pilot study that flips from top-down approaches where government and policymakers impose what they think is best for communities to a bottom-up system where a marginalised community is able to create its own advocacy for healthcare access at a grassroots level.

We have developed a TV game show concept where policymakers (healthcare professionals in our case) are challenged to explore how well they understand the needs of a marginalised community. The first stage of the show is to collate information on the healthcare needs and priorities from lesbian, bisexual and trans women as well as gender non-conforming individuals. The second stage involves the policymakers who play the game show. We will use a TV quiz show format with the policymakers separated into two teams, shown the list of healthcare needs and asked to guess the ranking from the community with points awarded for how well they match up.

To deliver this work, we are combining complementary experiences, with Kisumu Feminists Society providing a model of community driven healthcare intervention for marginalised people and Reimagine Redefine providing methods to parametrise this work. We aim to co-create meaningful data and build community connections, enabling this important resistance work to be shared widely as an evidence-based method.

Project Partners

Dr Ruby Zelzer

Dr Ruby Zelzer (she/her) is a knowledge and research consultant at Reimagine Redefine. She uses data research to analyse inequity within the research landscape and in healthcare. She is especially interested in how funders develop funding calls and how those processes subsequently affect the career development of Black and other marginalised researchers. Within the health field, Dr Zelzer’s interest is in healthcare inequities from both a patient perspective and the underlying disparities in the career paths of Black and other marginalised healthcare providers. She is a very active community builder and enjoys developing and supporting inclusive models that drive equity in academia and healthcare.

Beryl Opiyo (Afrika)

Beryl A. Opiyo, known as Afrika, is an African lesbian feminist from Kisumu, Kenya who is currently serving as the Executive Director of Kisumu Feminists Society, a vibrant feminist organization in Western Kenya that she founded in 2018. She has 8 years of hands-on experience from actively working with LBQ women and gender non-conforming persons both under/ over 35 years, particularly LBQT+ youth in Western Kenya where she has made impactful contributions to matters of sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR), feminist leadership and advocacy, self-care/wellness, and economic justice within the African context. She is currently pursuing a Bachelor in Laws (LLB) and on the side doubles as a feminist writer, content creator, organizer, and researcher. Her pronouns are She/Her/hers and her Twitter is @DecolonialBruja on Twitter and @LawfullyChaotic on Tiktok and Youtube.