2023 Press Releases

Northwestern University professor Brian Mustanski has been appointed to the Advisory Committee to the Director of National Institutes of Health (NIH), Dr. Monica Bertagnolli. Mustanski was invited to join the committee by Xavier Becerra, secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services. Mustanski’s appointment begins immediately and extends through 2027.

Mustanski is director of Northwestern’s Institute for Sexual and Gender Minority Health and Wellbeing (ISGMH), director of the NIH-funded Third Coast Center for AIDS Research (CFAR) and a professor in the department of medical social sciences at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. His research centers on HIV prevention and treatment and the health and development of LGBTQ+ youth.

Read the press release about Mustanski's NIH appointment.

Patients will soon be able to choose “X” as a sex designation at Northwestern Medicine’s 11 hospitals and more than 200 outpatient locations throughout Illinois. “X” is a sex designation on government identification documents that represents a legal sex other than male or female. Most commonly, people who are nonbinary, intersex or transgender may opt to use “X” instead of male “M” or female “F” as a sex designation on identification documents. The designation will be available as part of the health system’s electronic medical record beginning Dec. 18.

“Northwestern Medicine hospitals and outpatient centers affirm every patient’s gender identity,” said Sumanas Jordan, MD, PhD, director of the Gender Pathways Program at Northwestern Medicine. “The new medical record designation will enhance communication with patients, align with best practices and help our staff better meet the needs of the diverse population we serve.”

Read the Northwestern Medicine press release.

A new social awareness and community mobilization campaign called “PrEP4Teens,” a collaboration led by scientists at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine and community leaders in sexual health and youth engagement, will launch on Wednesday, Nov. 15 at TaskForce Prevention and Community Services in the Austin neighborhood of Chicago.

PrEP4Teens stems from research that identified lack of understanding and awareness as the main barriers for teenagers and young sexual and gender minorities to start taking pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP). PrEP are FDA-approved medications that reduce an individual’s chance of getting HIV from sex or injection drug use by as much as 99%. PrEP is approved for adolescent use.

Read the Prep4Teens press release.

Transgender women and Black gay and bisexual men in Chicago are nearly twice as likely to contract syphilis at some point in their lives as white gay men, according to a new study conducted by scientists at Northwestern University.

The study, “Syphilis prevalence, incidence, and demographic differences in a longitudinal study of young sexual and gender minority adults assigned male at birth,” is the first to examine syphilis over time among young sexual and gender minorities — a category which encompasses gay and bisexual men, trans women and non-binary individuals. They found meaningful demographic differences in prevalence, across participants’ lifetimes and during the six-month period of the study, leading to a more nuanced understanding of risk factors for the under researched group. The study was published  in The Journal of Infectious Diseases.

The research comes as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention plan to recommend doxy-PEP, a one-time dose of the antibiotic doxycycline, for use after an unprotected sexual encounter, to gay and bisexual men and trans women. The treatment could help curb cases of syphilis, gonorrhea and chlamydia.

Read the press release on increasing syphilis rates.

Although the Surgeon General published a report this week blaming social media in part for the youth mental health crisis, a Northwestern Medicine clinical psychologist is advising parents to look to the American Psychological Association’s (APA) advisory for more nuance.

“Saying social media is universally bad for youth is wrong and erases the good examples of what it can do for youth who are historically excluded, marginalized, or lack access to peers,” said Kathryn Macapagal, an associate professor of medical social sciences and psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. “This includes teens who are LGBTQ, immunocompromised or have disabilities, and rural youth.”

Read the press release on youth and social media.

New research from Northwestern University has shown that educating couples, rather than individuals, may be a highly effective strategy to end the HIV epidemic. The study, published recently in the Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, found that relationship education can benefit young same-sex male couples by reducing the occurrence of sexually transmitted infections and sexual risk behaviors. The report analyzes outcomes from the first randomized controlled trial of 2GETHER, a relationship-education and HIV-prevention program, and finds the program improves both biomedical and behavioral indicators of HIV risk.

Read the relationship education press release.

Trans Day of Visibility is March 31, marking a day to celebrate the accomplishments of the transgender and non-binary community and raise awareness of discrimination faced by trans people worldwide. With political attacks on trans rights moving through various state legislatures and international governing bodies — including bans on gender-affirming care for minors and limitations on involvement in sports — accurate reporting on gender nonconforming individuals is critically important. Experts from Northwestern can discuss a variety of topics in the headlines and beyond.

Read the Trans Day of Visibility press release. 

As South Carolina, Texas and Arizona have already introduced or moved forward on passing anti-drag legislation, in part due to Tennessee’s new bills, experts at Northwestern University worry this marks the beginning of rolling back growing protections for trans people in the U.S.  "The problems that these laws allegedly seek to solve have not been demonstrated or explained. There is no evidence of children getting hurt at drag shows, but suicide and homicide are leading causes of death for teenagers, and we should put our energy into these very real and solvable problems,” says Brian Mustanski, PhD.

Read the press release on anti-drag legislation.

When legal systems choose to offer no protections to sexual minorities, even avid LGBTQ supporters would reject their gay neighbors, reports a new Northwestern Medicine study. The study examined “superficial allies,” or those who express full support for sexual minorities while refusing neighboring proximity to them. The researchers found the absence of legal recognition and protection for sexual minorities at the national level increases sexual prejudice among both allies and stigmatizers. The research is the first to explore stigmatizing behaviors of people who fully accept homosexuality. Previous research focused solely on people who reject homosexuality.

Read the press release on superficial allies.

Viral suppression of HIV by antiretroviral medications helps slow transmission of the disease and keep individuals living with it healthy, at times making viral loads so low they are undetectable even on blood tests. Sixty-five percent of people diagnosed with HIV in the U.S. were virally suppressed as of 2020. Now, Northwestern University and Columbia University researchers have published findings on how to achieve greater numbers of viral suppression among the highest-risk sexual and gender minority men living with HIV in the U.S. South. The paper, published Feb. 1 in the journal AIDS, focused on existing methods to achieve viral suppression.

Read the press release on reaching high-risk men living with HIV.