A 61-year-old man has spoken out against what he describes as a humiliating and discriminatory experience at a hospital in Italy, after discovering that his doctor referred to him as a “homosexual patient” in a medical report.
Enzo Speranzini Anelli, who visited Santo Spirito Hospital in Pescara last Friday with his husband, said he immediately felt uncomfortable with the treating physician’s distant demeanour.
“When she was typing the report, she said aloud: ‘I’m noting homosexual patient,’” he told Il Messaggero, as reported by La Repubblica.
“I feel humiliated and discriminated against,” Anelli said. “I’ve never experienced anything like this before. I expected anything but to experience it in a hospital.”
Concern Over How the Report Will Be Used
Anelli is now worried that this mention of his sexual orientation could remain on record and be referenced by the Local Health Authority (ASL) in future.
However, Department Director Giustino Parruti tried to reassure the public, stating that the report is a personal document given only to the patient, and not accessible to unauthorised individuals.
Experts Weigh In
Massimo Andreoni, a professor of infectious diseases at the University of Rome, criticised the inclusion of Anelli’s sexual orientation in the report.
“Sexual orientation has no utility in the medical report,” he said. “We can discuss risky sexual behaviour if the information is relevant to treatment, but without making a distinction between homosexuals and heterosexuals.”
He added that sometimes such data is collected anonymously for epidemiological purposes, but only in the context of certain infectious diseases.
Hospital Response
The Pescara Local Health Authority issued a statement defending the report’s content.
“There was no violation of the patient’s privacy,” the statement read. “The contested wording appears exclusively in the initial outpatient visit report, a strictly personal document given solely to the interested party, as would have been the case for a heterosexual patient, without any distinction.”
They also claimed that explicit verbal consent to include the information was obtained from the patient in the presence of witnesses.
Legal and Social Context in Italy
While Italy does not legally recognise same-sex marriage, it does ban discrimination based on sexual orientation in employment. However, broader protections for LGBTQ+ people are lacking.
For example, trans people are not explicitly protected under national anti-discrimination laws — although a 2023 court ruling determined that anti-trans discrimination can be considered a form of sex-based discrimination.
