While gay and lesbian psychiatrists in the United States are a large and influential segment of the psychiatric community, in other nations they are nearly invisible in the face of societal attitudes that allow no place for homosexual doctors.

An international group of gay and lesbian psychiatrists took a major, and for some, risky step toward increasing their visibility in August at the World Psychiatric Association's 10th World Congress in Madrid, Spain.

For the first time ever, the WPA's scientific program included a symposium devoted entirely to the unique aspects of being a gay or lesbian psychiatrist and treating gay and lesbian patients.

Titled "Perspectives on Gay Affirmative Psychiatry," presentations focused on a variety of topics that provided a broad grounding in the state of knowledge about homosexuality and the role of psychiatrists in treating patients with that sexual orientation. Among the issues addressed were the consequences of homophobia and stigma on psychiatrists and their patients; the often-overlooked or misunderstood concerns of gay Asians; varying depictions of homosexuality in psychiatry textbooks; discrimination against homosexuals in European psychoanalytic institutes; and the role that psychiatrists and APA have played in combating prejudice and advocating civil rights protections for gay men and lesbians.

Deeply Embedded Prejudice

The discussant for the symposium was APA Medical Director Melvin Sabshin, M.D., who said he was honored to be the discussant and impressed with how much new information he learned from the speakers. He told Psychiatric News he was struck in particular by "reports of the intense prejudice that still exists against homosexual psychiatrists and against potential psychoanalytic candidates."

The latter issue was discussed in the context of a survey of German psychoanalytic institutes whose results, presented by German psychiatrist Jrgen Graffe, documented considerable opposition to accepting gay or lesbian candidates for psychoanalytic training.

Symposium chair Guy Glass, M.D., of Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York, estimated that about 60 psychiatrists attended the symposium, several of whom indicated that this was their first opportunity to break through their professional isolation and meet openly with gay and lesbian colleagues from other nations.

Distressing accounts of deeply embedded prejudice against them were expressed by gay psychiatrists from countries outside North America and Western Europe who stressed that they had no hope of continuing to practice medicine in their home countries if word of their sexual orientation ever became known, Glass told Psychiatric News. He said he heard particularly poignant stories of deep-seated prejudice against homosexuals and fear of discovery from psychiatrists from the Dominican Republic, Poland, South America, and the Czech Republic, among others.

First International Meeting

Another landmark event that occurred in conjunction with the Madrid WPA Congress was the first international meeting of the Association of Gay and Lesbian Psychiatrists (AGLP). Cosponsored by APA and the Bundes Arbeits Gemeinschaft Scwule im Gesundheitswesen (BASG), a German organization of gay health care workers, the meeting and reception attracted approximately 50 psychiatrists from 19 countries, according to psychiatrist Gene Nakajima, M.D., of UCLA, one of the organizers of the AGLP meeting.

The special AGLP meeting was designed to provide a forum for gay and lesbian psychiatrists from countries where there are no opportunities to network and discuss relevant issues with colleagues, Nakajima explained. In some cases this was the first chance gay psychiatrists had to meet gay colleagues from their own country, as was the case with several psychiatrists from host country Spain, he noted. Participants at the meeting clearly felt free to share ideas about ways to fight antigay discrimination and to educate people about gay-related issues, he added.

To expand networking opportunities for psychiatrists outside the U.S. and Canada, the AGLP, an independent psychiatric organization of about 500 members affiliated with APA and headquartered in Philadelphia, recently established a new membership category with reduced dues for international psychiatrists.

(Psychiatric News, October 18, 1996)