Gender expansive people assigned female at birth, gender expansive people assigned male at birth, and transgender men had greater odds of reporting cannabis use with small percentages of heavy episodic alcohol and tobacco use.
This is according to a study – “Substance Use Over Time Among Sexual and Gender Minority People: Differences at the Intersection of Sex and Gender” by Annesa Flentje, Gowri Sunder, Alexis Ceja, et al – that appeared in LGBT Health.
As it is, sexual and gender minority (SGM) people are reported to be at greater risk for substance use than heterosexual and cisgender people. This study wanted to build on this by examining substance use over time among SGM people to identify patterns of polysubstance use at the intersection of sex and gender.
Data were collected annually over four years from SGM respondents (n = 11,822) in The Population Research in Identity and Disparities for Equality (PRIDE) Study. Differences in substance use patterns (any prior 30-day use of 15 substances) by gender subgroup were examined with latent class analysis, and multinomial regression models tested relationships between gender subgroup and substance use.
The study’s findings included:
- Eight classes of substance use were observed.
- The three most common patterns were low substance use (49%), heavy episodic alcohol use (≥5 alcoholic drinks on one occasion) with some cannabis and tobacco use (14%), and cannabis use with some tobacco and declining heavy episodic alcohol use (13%).
- Differences observed included lower odds of patterns defined by heavy episodic alcohol use with some cannabis and tobacco use in all gender subgroups relative to cisgender men and persons with low substance use (odds ratios [ORs] 0.26–0.60).
- Gender expansive people assigned female at birth, gender expansive people assigned male at birth, and transgender men had greater odds of reporting cannabis use with small percentages of heavy episodic alcohol and tobacco use (ORs: 1.41–1.60).
For the researchers, there is a need to tailor responses to polysubstance use and abuse. Specific to members of the LGBTQIA community, “there are unique patterns of polysubstance use over time among gender subgroups of SGM people”, and these need to be checked to be tackled.
