Call for Proposals: Trans and Gender Diverse Healthcare

At a time when trans and gender diverse healthcare is advancing in science yet retreating in policy, a global journal is opening its doors to voices that can no longer be sidelined.

Sexual and Reproductive Health Matters (SRHM) has announced a call for submissions for a forthcoming themed issue on ‘Trans and Gender Diverse Healthcare,’ inviting scholars, practitioners and community voices to contribute research and reflections at a moment of profound global urgency.

Across healthcare systems, trans and gender diverse care has undergone a significant transformation. Medical and scientific communities are increasingly embracing evidence-based, patient-centred models that prioritise informed consent, depathologisation and recognition of diverse lived realities. Organisations such as the World Health Organisation and the World Professional Association for Transgender Health continue to update standards that affirm gender diversity as part of human variation, not pathology.

Yet these advances are unfolding alongside an alarming political backlash. In many regions, access to gender-affirming and sexual and reproductive healthcare is being restricted through legislation and policy decisions that override medical expertise. These measures affect not only minors but increasingly adults, producing a public health crisis where access to care depends on geography rather than need, evidence or rights. The resulting harms are tangible, from interrupted care and worsening mental health to heightened exposure to stigma, discrimination and violence.

SRHM’s themed issue aims to respond directly to this crisis by creating space for rigorous, grounded and community-informed scholarship. The issue welcomes proposals examining access to healthcare, technological and medical advances, legal and policy frameworks, stigma and violence, data and monitoring innovations, and community-based healthcare initiatives, including self-care and peer-led practices.

Particular attention is encouraged on intersecting realities, including disability, chronic illness, incarceration, conflict settings, migration and socioeconomic marginalisation. The journal also explicitly recognises the leadership of trans and gender diverse people as researchers, healthcare providers and knowledge producers.

Following assessment of the initial proposals, selected authors will be directly invited to submit their full manuscripts to the issue. Mentoring will be available for less-experienced authors, where required. Full details of requirements for proposals can be found here: https://www.tandfonline.com/action/authorSubmission?show=instructions&journalCode=zrhm21

All proposals and any queries should be emailed to SRHM’s Managing Editor (pete.chapman@srhm.org). The call for proposals asks applicants to include the subject line ‘Proposal: Trans and Gender Diverse Healthcare’ in their message.

The deadline for proposals to be received is 1 February 2026. Only proposals submitted by the deadline and to the email address listed above will be considered.

Each emailed proposal should include the following:

• A cover letter describing the relevance of the proposed manuscript to the themed issue and a statement about whether the present work is part of a larger project and/or potentially associated with other publications (if so, please provide details)
• A list of authors and their affiliations
• An abstract for the proposed paper (up to 300 words). Please do not send full manuscripts via email
• Proposed article type

In a moment when politics threatens to eclipse science, SRHM’s call is clear: evidence, equity and lived experience must remain at the centre of healthcare.Source: Website of Sexual and Reproductive Health Matters (SRHM)