This edited volume fills an important gap in health communication, exploring the significant disparities in access to health care and health coverage that LGBT individuals and their families face. With cutting-edge empirical research, the essays examine the social and structural factors that lead to the stigma and discrimination that LGBT populations experience.

Vickie L. Harvey is professor of communication studies at California State University, Stanislaus.
Teresa Heinz Housel is associate professor of communication at Hope College.

Foreword
Gary L. Kreps
Foreword
Allan D. Peterkin
Part I: Constructing Identity by Coming Out to Your Physician
1.An Introduction to the Loosely Knit Patchwork of LGBT Health Care
Teresa Heinz Housel and Vickie L. Harvey
2.The Importance of Sexual Orientation Disclosure to Physicians for Women Who Have Sex with Women
Karina Willes and Mike Allen
3.Coming Out Conversations and Gay/Bisexual Men's Sexual Health: A Constitutive Model Study
Jimmie Manning
4.Shaping Self with the Doctor: The Construction of Identity for Trans Patients
Katy Ross, Juliann C. Scholl, and Gina Castle Bell
Part II: Access, Disparities and Harassment Under the Guise of Policies
5.Health Insurance Coverage For Same-Sex Couples: Disparities and Trends under DOMA
Gilbert Gonzales, Ryan Moltz, and Miriam King
6.Carving Triangles into Squares: The Effects of LGBTQ Stigma Related Stressors During Youth, Adulthood, and Aging
Dawn L. Strongin, Marc J. Silva, and Fredrick Smiley
7.Reproductive Physicians' Treatment of Lesbian Patients in Germany and the United States
Alicia VandeVusse
Part III: Silencing, Violence, and Other Forms of Intimidation of LGBT People
8.Limiting Transgender Health: Administrative Violence and Microaggressions in Health Care Systems
Sonny Nordmarken and Reese Kelly
9.Women's Health, Health Care Service Utilization, and Experience of Intimate Partner Violence in the United States
Bethany Coston
10.Political Activism as a Health-Giving Activity: Transforming Silence into Language and Action
Michael Warren Tumolo