About the Talk

Our Health Matters: Indian Trans Men and Transmasculine Health is a mixed-methods community-based participatory research project on the social determinants of transmasculine people’s mental health and access to care in India. In this talk, Dr. Ayden Scheim and Shaman Gupta discuss research gaps in transmasculine health, and how their project leverages community strengths and knowledge to begin filling these gaps. They share findings from the project’s qualitative phase, and describe the process of using research data and community knowledge to develop policy- and socially-relevant survey measures.

About the Speakers

Dr. Ayden Scheim is an Assistant Professor in Epidemiology and Biostatistics at the Dornsife School of Public Health, Drexel University. As a social epidemiologist, he is interested in understanding (and ultimately, transforming) the impacts of social, policy, and healthcare environments on the health of stigmatized populations. He currently conducts community-engaged health equity research with trans people and people who use drugs in multiple countries, as well as methods research on measuring intersectional discrimination. Dr. Scheim received a PhD in Epidemiology and Biostatistics (2017) from Western University in Canada where he was a Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation Scholar, and completed postdoctoral training at the University of California, San Diego as a Canadian Institutes of Health Research Fellow.

Shaman Gupta, Co-Chair, TWEET (Transgender Welfare Equity and Empowerment Trust) has worked with thousands of young trans men across India, to provide them with legal, health, and employment support. Through his work at TWEET, he has been instrumental in setting up shelter homes and skill building initiatives for trans men in India and is working towards enabling other young trans men to join the movement for advocacy and empowerment.