Under the rainbow: lesbian and bisexual women’s perspectives on health and disease

Abstract

This study aimed to understand the meanings that homosexual and bisexual women give to the state of health and disease and how they evaluate their own well-being framework. This was qualitative research consisting of the accounts of 14 women from the municipality of Imperatriz, Maranhão, Brazil. Medical anthropology and gender studies contributed in the analysis of the categories “Dimensions of health and illness” and “The look on one’s own health.” These sections discussed dualistic mind-body perspectives that etiologically characterized the health-disease process in the view of these interlocutors. Moreover, the sociocultural context was understood as formatting the way they translated and evaluated their own health condition, a context crossed by the bisexual and lesbian experience. Therefore, the sexual identities and behaviors of the interviewees cause friction with the rigidity of how the health-disease process is interpreted by biomedical knowledge, questioning practices that marginalize these women in health care services.