Experiences of the Nursing Professional when Providing Humanized Care to People with Gender Diversity

Abstract

Introduction: Health care by nursing professionals to people with gender diversity can be negatively affected by the heteronormativity that has historically governed society. It is challenging to safeguard and seek actions to provide inclusive humanized care. Objective: To understand the nursing professional’s experiences when providing humanized care to people with gender diversity. Method: Qualitative research with a phenomenological approach. Four nursing professionals were interviewed. The information was collected through semi-structured individual and group interviews; the discourses were analyzed, and central concepts were triangulated. Results: Humanized care is manifested through three dimensions: experiences in providing humanized care, factors that facilitate the delivery of humanized care and factors that hinder it. The categories included in the first dimension are equality, empathy, respect and learning. Factors that facilitate humanized care have the categories of welcoming and continuing education, and factors that hinder it have the categories of social name and suspicion. Conclusion: Humanized care for people with gender diversity requires values of equality and empathy, together with inclusive training from undergraduate level. Deficiency in the development of soft skills hinders the nurse-patient relationship, while suspicion of the gender-diverse person hinders first consultations. The integration of the social name and continuous training are essential to promote an environment of trust and reduce the feeling of vulnerability and discrimination.