Recent Funding Impacts to LGBTQIA+ Health Research with PRIDEnet and The PRIDE Study

June 9, 2025

Over the last decade, PRIDEnet, which is based at Stanford University, has catalyzed LGBTQIA+ health research through two large research studies:

  • The PRIDE Study, which is based at Stanford University and is the first, national, longitudinal research study focused on the physical, mental, and social health of LGBTQIA+ adults. Since 2017, the team has enrolled more than 30,000 participants and published 79 manuscripts with dozens more under review.
  • The NIH’s All of Us Research Program, which is designed to enroll one million or more participants across the United States, with the PRIDEnet team charged with LGBTQIA+ engagement since 2017.
[Everyone] should feel proud of this work that we've done together, and we really could not have done this without you.

“All the participants, all the community partners, all the ambassadors should feel proud of this work that we've done together, and we really could not have done this without you,” said Mitchell R. Lunn, MD, MAS, FACP, FASN, Associate Professor of Medicine and Co-Director of The PRIDE Study. “Over these years, we've conducted research in partnership with investigators and community members across the country on topics from health intersections, social health, physical health, mental health, and disparities and inequities among particular subpopulations, as well as the resiliencies and factors that bring our communities joy.”

Given the program’s commitment to transparency, the PRIDEnet team provided updates at a town hall webinar hosted on May 12, 2025, given the shifting landscape of research funding in our nation.

  • As of March 14, 2025, the federal Government terminated PRIDEnet’s award to support LGBTQIA+ engagement for All of Us. As a result, PRIDEnet is no longer conducting activities for All of Us.
  • Additional grants, where PRIDEnet was a subawardee, have also been affected including: 
    • A study by Annesa Flentje, PhD (Stanford University / University of California, San Francisco) on the biological underpinnings of stress;
    • A study by Heidi Moseson, PhD, MPH (Ibis Reproductive Health) testing surveys with customizable language and/or organ inventories;
    • A study by Lauren Houghton, PhD (Columbia University) on breast/chest cancer and other cancer screenings among trans, nonbinary, and gender diverse people; and
    • A study by Phillip W. Schnarrs, PhD (University of Texas at Austin / University of Pittsburgh) on expanding the sexual and gender minority adverse childhood experiences scale.

In total, the termination of these research studies has resulted in a loss of more than $4.5 million dollars in secured funding and millions more in prospective funding for PRIDEnet.

As a result, the PRIDEnet team is pausing many of the activities historically integral to the program, such as utilizing community ambassadors to engage with LGBTQIA+ communities across the nation, and is reducing their workforce by two-thirds.

“We're in this hard moment, but when we reflect on where we started, The PRIDE Study was born out of the dueling foci of hard places and hope. The goal was to let our stories, our realities, our struggles be known, and also highlight the amazing creativity, beauty, and diversity of our communities,” said Juno Obedin-Maliver, MD, MPH, MAS, FACOG, Associate Professor of Obstetrics & Gynecology and Co-Director of The PRIDE Study. “It was from that place that we started The PRIDE Study, and where we are hoping to return — even in this hard moment — in the future. Our hope going forward is to focus on rebuilding and how we can move forward.”

After updates were provided during the town hall webinar, PRIDEnet leadership addressed questions from attendees. Key takeaways from the discussion are summarized below.

The PRIDE Study is continuing!

Even through these hardships, The PRIDE Study is continuing. Over the past decade, The PRIDE Study has helped transform health and health policy, lawsuits, and legal action. The annual questionnaire, which is launched every year, launched again on June 2, 2025.

We hear regularly from people that [The PRIDE Study] reflects their lives...

“We hear regularly from people that it reflects their lives, and we are committed to doing that, and that continues most immediately through the activities that have been central from the beginning,” noted Obedin-Maliver. “We want to focus on the annual questionnaire and share that with you, because we're asking incredibly important questions that are relevant, especially during this challenging time and where we are standing. We can continue to ask health questions and help partner with the community, especially as sadly, other research projects are becoming eradicated.”

The PRIDE Study may be one of the only longitudinal studies collecting sexual orientation and gender identity data at this time and moving forward.

Is the information provided in The PRIDE Study surveys kept safe?

Data privacy is a top priority for The PRIDE Study team. The PRIDE Study has a Certificate of Confidentiality (CoC) from the National Institutes of Health, which allows them to protect your identifiable, sensitive information in perpetuity. The CoC’s protection is based on federal law that prohibits disclosure of a research participant’s identifiable, sensitive information in any federal, state, or local civil, criminal, administrative, legislative, or other proceeding (unless participants request in writing that they do). This means Stanford University is prohibited from sharing the information if requested in legal discovery such as a subpoena request by the federal government. Stanford University is committed to upholding its legal and ethical obligation to protect disclosure of your information to the fullest extent of the law.

Does The PRIDE Study still have funding, and where does the funding come from?

The PRIDE Study does still have some funding. One source of the funding is a foundation that's supporting a particular research project. Another source of funding is the institutional support from Stanford University, which includes the discretionary funds that Lunn and Obedin-Maliver have been saving for difficult times as well as funding from various departments in the Stanford School of Medicine.

However, the recent federal grant terminations have had a significant financial impact on The PRIDE Study. In efforts to continue their groundbreaking LGBTQIA+ health research, The PRIDE Study leadership is working on securing additional funding provided through philanthropy, non-governmental organizations, foundations, and other sources that support research infrastructure and other tools.

How can the community get involved?

  1. Participate in LGBTQIA+ research that is continuing, such as The PRIDE Study’s annual questionnaire, is important because people's participation and the resulting data demonstrates that there's a continued need for additional funding.
    1. If you are not a participant already, become one at register.pridestudy.org.
    2. If you are a researcher, the PRIDEnet team is continuing to conduct ancillary studies which are high-quality, community-engaged, research collaborations that aim to improve the health and well-being of LGBTQIA+ communities. Learn more at pridestudy.org/collaborate.
  2. Advocate for your communities and contact your elected officials.
  3. Consider donating to financially support the work if you are financially able to. Learn more at pridestudy.org/donate.
  4. Connect with the team at pridenetconnect@stanford.edu and continue to engage by signing up for the PRIDEnet newsletter at https://q-r.to/PRIDEnetNews. Reshare the research, events, and news with your networks.