How Boynton Health at the University of Minnesota Supports LGBTQ+ Health and Wellness

Minnesota has been known in the past couple of years to be a place of refuge for the LGBTQ+ community. It is one of the reasons several LGBTQ+ students come to and study at the University of Minnesota – Twin Cities.

Along with clubs and other student organizations, Boynton Health, the University’s healthcare services on campus, provides a safe space for LGBTQ+ students when it comes to their health and well-being.

Boynton has resources for everybody in the LGBTQ+ community, but one of their main areas of care is with the Gender Care Team.

Some of the resources offered through the Gender Care Team are hormone replacement therapy, binding consultation service, referrals and support for gender-affirming surgeries, fertility preservation and family building, preoperative exams and Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis (PrEP) medication, to name a few.

Megan Smith is a medical provider on the team who specializes in primary, urgent and gender care at Boynton and has been with Boynton for a little over a year. She helps out with hormone replacement therapy, as she primarily does gender care, along with other general medical issues as well.

Many of the LGBTQ+ students utilize mental health services, according to Smith, and Boynton is in the process of providing more resources for the University’s transgender students.

When asked what was the motivation behind growing Boynton’s Gender Care Team, Smith said the team sees the need to have more resources for students.

“We want everyone to feel welcomed here at the U,” Smith said. “Minnesota is one of those states that people are coming to get this kind of treatment.”

Van Vu is the chair of Boynton’s Gender Care Team and is one of the counselors who works with LGBTQ+ students who are struggling with their mental health. 

Vu said the University is always striving to have better resources surrounding LGBTQ+ healthcare so students can feel good about themselves and their own gender care.

Vu encourages her patients to form communities while at the University so they can always have support through their journey. On the flipside, Vu encourages the University community to support LGBTQ+ students.

“There is a lot of passion among faculty and staff to drive advocacy services that support our LGBTQ students,” Vu said.

The University’s Student Legal Services assists with legal name changes, and senior staff attorney Adam Elling, along with his paralegal Karin Wells, are the people to go to on campus to aid in this process.

Most of the work Elling and Wells do with students going through the name change process has to do with paperwork. The first step is to do an intake where the student fills out a questionnaire so Elling and Wells can write the name change application being presented at court.

Once the hearing date is set up, Elling and Wells meet with the student once more to get them as comfortable as possible to appear in front of the judge. The hearing consists of the student telling their story as to why they want their name changed, have their witnesses testify and have the judge grant the change, according to Elling.

This is where it gets difficult, though, since once the name change is granted, students have to go to all of the agencies that have their dead name listed and change it, Elling said.

For students who may be struggling throughout the process, Elling and Wells do their best to help however they can but will also refer students to Boynton’s mental health resources as well.

Smith said she is a big advocate for “Health Care For All,” which is why she chose to be a part of Boynton’s Gender Care Team. She added she gets to see patients open up and feels rewarded when she gets to see patients finally reach their goals in the process.

Vu said she has family members who identify as LGBTQ+ and has personally witnessed those family members experience “inhuman treatment.”

“[Those experiences] really drives me toward changing the healthcare system and the services that we offer to be more supportive of LGBTQ students,” Vu said. “To be impactful to these students at this particular stage in their life can have a really long lasting impact.”

Elling said it is the moment of relief that washes over students faces when the judge grants the name change is his highlight of being able to work in the name changing process at the University.

“You can see it on the face of the student, and I feel it,” Elling said. “It’s kind of a euphoric feeling to know that they are now out in the world who they have been for the first time in their entire lives.”

One of the main challenges the Gender Care Team may face are helping people get to where they want to be and guiding them through their expectations, Smith said.

“[Changes] are not immediate, so that can be really frustrating for people that it takes a long time because a lot of patients have already been waiting a long time to do this,” Smith said.

Smith reminds her patients that they will get there eventually and this process takes time, reminding them to keep their goals in sight.

Smith, Vu, Elling and Wells all said the numbers of LGBTQ+ students they see have risen in the past year, and they look forward to being stepping stones to as many students as they can at the University in order to get to where they want to be when it comes to gender care.

The Boynton Gender Care Team works closely with the University’s Gender and Sexuality Center for Queer and Trans life and hopes to work with them more in the future to help grow their own programs. They also hope to hire more gender care providers in the coming years.

“This has been a process often for people that doesn’t just involve them,” Wells said. “Even though it seems like it’s just a process on paper, there’s a lot that goes into it.”