Alexandra Torsell Starud

I am a PhD student at Karolinska Institutet. My doctoral project, Targeted Sexual-Health Prevention and Institutional Trust among MSM and Sexual Minorities in Stockholm, examines inequalities in access to and uptake of sexual-health prevention and the role of institutional trust.

The project is closely connected to Venhälsan in Stockholm, a specialist clinic for sexual health, and combines clinical, survey, population and spatial data. My research uses epidemiological and quantitative methods to study how social, socioeconomic and geographical conditions relate to preventive healthcare and institutional trust.

My research interests lie at the intersection of sexual health, social epidemiology, health equity and institutional trust. I am particularly interested in inequalities in access to and uptake of preventive healthcare among sexual and other minoritised populations.

My work is informed by an intersectional perspective, recognising that minority positions entail differential exposure to structural discrimination and shape people’s relationships with institutions and institutional power. I am interested in how these social and historical contexts may be relevant to institutional trust, healthcare access and engagement with preventive interventions.

My doctoral research examines these questions in the context of sexual-health prevention among men who have sex with men and other sexual minorities in Stockholm. The project combines clinical, survey, population and spatial data to study uptake of preventive interventions, socioeconomic and geographical inequalities, experiences of stigma and privacy, and institutional trust.

Methodologically, my interests include social epidemiology, register-based research, quantitative intersectional approaches and spatial analysis.