Gays, bisexuals more likely to seek mental health treatment

The researchers suggest this segment is nearly twice as likely to seek mental health treatment, mostly from discrimination, violence, and stressful life events, than general population.

Study Details

To reach the findings, Susan Cochran in collaboration with UCLA researchers analyzed data from the California Health Interview Survey on 2074 people.

After comparing the sexual minorities and associated mental health treatments, the team found that 48.5 percent of lesbian/gay/bisexual individuals had reported receiving mental health treatment in the past year as compared to 22.5 percent of heterosexuals.

"The findings showed that minority sexual orientation predisposes individuals to seek out services, despite pervasive barriers that exist within the service delivery system that might even discourage their use by this population," the authors write.

Gender does matter

Further, they found that gender to play a large role: heterosexual men were the least likely to receive mental health treatment, while lesbians and bisexual women were most likely.

Cochran says: "It is well known that health services utilization is greater among women generally. Here we have shown that minority sexual orientation is also an important consideration. Lesbians and bisexual women appear to be approximately twice as likely as heterosexual women to report having received recent treatment for mental health or substance use disorders."

Researchers believe that the risk of facing discrimination, violence and other stressful life events are some factors that can drive this increased use of healthcare.

Cochran adds: "The pervasive and historically rooted societal pathologizing of homosexuality may contribute to this propensity for treatment by construing homosexuality and issues associated with it as mental health problems."

The study was published Friday in the journal BMC Psychiatry.