Physicians' Attitudes Toward Transgender Individuals and Commitment to Treat Them by Religiosity

Background: This study aimed to examine the association between the three subscales of the Transgender Attitudes and Beliefs Scale and professional commitment to treat transgender patients, and to test whether these associations were related to the physician's level of religiosity. Methods: A cross-sectional study of 109 family physicians was conducted using a self-administered questionnaire between October 2021 and July 2023 in the southern district of Clalit Healthcare Services. Confirmatory factor analysis and multi-group structural equation modeling were carried out. Main measures included TABS subscales, level of religiosity, and physicians' commitment to treat transgender patients. Results: Only the 'Human value' subscale was a statistically significant positive predictor of professional commitment to treat transgender patients among the whole population of physicians and among the subgroup of physicians with high religiosity at β = 0.36 (95% Confidence interval (CI) 0.11 to 0.61, p = 0.005), and β = 0.57 (95% CI 0.20 to 0.95, p = 0.003), respectively. Among physicians with a low level of religiosity there was a significant positive effect of the 'Interpersonal comfort' subscale on the professional commitment to treat transgender patients at β = 3.31 (95% CI 1.66 to 4.95, p < 0.001). Although the 'Sex/gender beliefs' subscale showed a significant negative association in the primary model (β = -2.91, 95% CI -4.64 to -1.17, p = 0.001), sensitivity analyses suggested that this finding should be interpreted with caution because of the strong correlation between TABS domains. Conclusions: Different TABS domains were associated with physicians' professional commitment to treat transgender patients across levels of religiosity. These findings can help tailor interventions more effectively to specific religiosity subgroups.