GLMA, Health Professionals Advancing LGBTQ Equality

What GLMA Is

GLMA is the largest and oldest association of LGBTQ+ healthcare professionals in the world, operating as a national membership organization dedicated to ensuring health equity for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer communities. Founded in 1981 as the American Association of Physicians for Human Rights, the organization spent its early decades focused on HIV issues and physicians coming out at work. Over the past two decades, it has evolved into a comprehensive advocacy, education, and research organization addressing the full scope of LGBTQ+ health, from gender-affirming care to cancer screening, mental health, substance abuse, and tobacco use.

GLMA's membership includes approximately 1,000 health professionals: physicians, nurses, advanced practice nurses, physician assistants, researchers, academics, behavioral health specialists, health profession students, and other healthcare workers. Members live and work across the United States and in several other countries, representing major healthcare disciplines and a wide range of specialties. Originally open only to physicians, residents, and medical students, the organization expanded in 2002 to include all types of LGBTQ+ health professionals.

The main resource GLMA offers to the public is not a direct care service but a tool: the LGBTQ+ Healthcare Directory, a free searchable database connecting patients with affirming providers across the US and Canada.

The LGBTQ+ Healthcare Directory: What You Get

The LGBTQ+ Healthcare Directory is the service GLMA runs for patients. It's a modern, searchable platform designed to help LGBTQ+ people find inclusive, knowledgeable providers in their area. The directory was originally developed as an exclusive resource for GLMA members, but in 2022, GLMA partnered with the Tegan and Sara Foundation to reimagine it as a fully free, public resource open to anyone, no membership or sign-up required.

The platform uses a searchable interface to help you find providers near you. You can filter by location, the type of care you're seeking, and the kind of provider. The directory includes virtual care options, so you can find providers who offer telehealth, and offers expanded search functionality to narrow results by your specific needs. Coverage extends to all US states and 10 Canadian provinces, giving the resource continental scope.

The directory lists more than 2,700 providers as of its first year after the public launch. During its first year as a public resource, the directory recorded over 43,000 searches, showing the demand for this kind of tool. The site emphasizes that LGBTQ+ patients deserve healthcare providers they can be open and honest with, free from fear of stigma or bias. The Directory was built to meet this need.

How to use it: you go to the GLMA website, navigate to the Find a Provider section, and search by location, provider type, or care category. The platform returns matching providers in your area, along with information about their practice, credentials, and whether they offer virtual care. Since the directory is free and requires no account creation, you can search anonymously.

Who Runs GLMA and How

GLMA is a membership association, not a telemedicine platform or a network of employed providers. It's an advocacy and professional organization, meaning its members are doctors, nurses, and other licensed healthcare professionals across the country who are LGBTQ+ themselves or deeply committed to LGBTQ+ affirming care. They keep independent practices and work in hospitals, clinics, and private offices; they don't work for GLMA.

The directory aggregates providers who either are members of GLMA or have self-registered in the public directory. The organization vets member credentials and ensures they meet professional standards, but the actual providers run their own practices. GLMA doesn't employ clinicians or dictate their scope of work; it connects people with existing providers in the field.

GLMA does far more than run a directory. The organization actively advocates for LGBTQ+ health equity through policy work, including fighting discriminatory state bills and supporting gender-affirming care access. It funds and promotes research through the Lesbian Health Fund, addressing health disparities and knowledge gaps in LGBTQ+ communities, particularly for Black, Indigenous, and other people of color, intersex people, and other historically marginalized identities. The organization hosts an annual conference on LGBTQ+ health with continuing education for health professionals and resources for patients.

What the Directory Provides and What It Doesn't

The LGBTQ+ Healthcare Directory tells you a provider's name, location, type of practice, and whether they offer virtual care. It gives you enough information to decide if they're worth calling. You can see what kind of provider they are, what they specialize in, and how to reach them.

What the directory doesn't do: it doesn't tell you wait times, fees, whether they accept your insurance, or what specific conditions they treat most. It doesn't offer in-person consultation or recommendation beyond matching you to an affirming provider. The directory is a starting point, not a complete intake; you'll need to call the provider to discuss your actual care, costs, and whether they have openings.

There's no automated booking or appointment scheduling through the directory. You find a provider and then contact them directly using the information listed. This means the speed of getting an appointment depends entirely on that provider's own schedule.

Who GLMA's Directory Fits

The directory fits any LGBTQ+ person anywhere in the US or Canada looking for a healthcare provider they can be honest with. It works especially well for someone newly out or newly transitioning who wants to find a clinician experienced with LGBTQ+ patients, rather than gambling on whether a random provider will be affirming.

It fits someone seeking gender-affirming care, mental health support, primary care, or any other healthcare need from a provider known to be LGBTQ+ competent. It works for people searching by geography, provider type, or care category. It works for employers, institutions, and state governments seeking to connect their populations with affirming care, as the directory serves diverse user types.

The directory doesn't fit someone needing immediate crisis care; it's a referral tool, not an emergency service. It doesn't fit someone looking for a specific modality (like a therapist trained in a particular technique) in the first search; you'd need to call providers to ask about their specific training. It doesn't guarantee insurance coverage or affordability; it's a connection tool, not a payment facilitator.

Partnership and Scope

GLMA is supported by partnerships that have shaped the public directory's success. The Tegan and Sara Foundation, Cigna, and Wide Eye have all contributed to the directory's development and launch. This partnership model means the directory benefits from funding for maintenance and expansion, though the core service remains free and public.

The directory is not a marketplace or a commercial platform. It's a nonprofit resource built by a professional association to address a real gap: that many LGBTQ+ people struggle to find healthcare providers they can trust, and that information asymmetry costs time, money, and health outcomes. The scale of the first-year traffic (43,000+ searches) shows the unmet need the directory serves.

The GLMA directory is most useful as a starting point: a way to find providers who have self-identified as LGBTQ+ affirming or are members of a professional organization dedicated to LGBTQ+ health equity. From there, the work is yours: calling providers, checking insurance, discussing your specific needs. But it removes the most painful part of the search, the fear that you'll end up in a room with someone who doesn't understand or doesn't support who you are.