MINNEAPOLIS/ST. PAUL (6/30/2021) —The Program in Human Sexuality (PHS) has achieved the status of an institute in the Department of Family Medicine and Community Health at the University of Minnesota Medical School. With this elevated status, PHS is announcing a rebranding and subsequent name change. The Program in Human Sexuality is now the Institute for Sexual and Gender Health (ISGH). 

This name change reflects the academic excellence and clinical growth built over the past 50 years. The Institute for Sexual and Gender Health’s clinical enterprise serves thousands of individuals, couples and families throughout the Midwest. Their research and educational endeavors influence international, national and local policy. Routinely collaborating with organizations, such as the World Health Organization, the World Association for Sexual Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, ISGH faculty work to raise awareness of sexual rights as an inherent part of universal human rights based on freedom, dignity and equality.

"The elevation of the Institute for Sexual and Gender Health from a program to an institute is overdue,” said James Pacala, MD, MS, head of the Department of Family Medicine and Community Health. “This group has been at the forefront of progress on every significant issue regarding sexual and gender health for the past 50 years. The institute will advance its proud legacy into the next 50 years."

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Debuting with the new name is a symbol intended to highlight ISGH’s multidisciplinary approach to sexual and gender health:

  • Circle: Develop, provide and promote evidence-based best clinical care. 

  • Hourglass: Advancing groundbreaking discovery through bio-psycho-social gender and sexuality research. 

  • Triangle: Advocating for sex and gender rights. 

  • Rectangle: Advancing a nationally and internationally recognized center for sexual and gender health education. 

These elements come together to create the symbol that reflects the work being done at the newly named Institute for Sexual and Gender Health.

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About the University of Minnesota Medical School
The University of Minnesota Medical School is at the forefront of learning and discovery, transforming medical care and educating the next generation of physicians. Our graduates and faculty produce high-impact biomedical research and advance the practice of medicine. We acknowledge that the U of M Medical School, both the Twin Cities campus and Duluth campus, is located on traditional, ancestral and contemporary lands of the Dakota and the Ojibwe, and scores of other Indigenous people, and we affirm our commitment to tribal communities and their sovereignty as we seek to improve and strengthen our relations with tribal nations. For more information about the U of M Medical School, please visit med.umn.edu.