Health service quality is understood to be a crucial determinant in successful patient-physician encounters and patient health. One common feeling that patients have reported experiencing during appointments is shame. We hypothesized that patients who experience appearance-based shame during an appointment are not likely to return to the same physician and that patients who do not experience appearance-based shame are likely to return to the same physician. This was assessed by conducting an anonymous online survey of 13 questions that served to establish a general foundation for understanding the participants' physical characteristics such as race, age, weight, and gender identity as well as their overall patient-physician relationship and experiences of shame, if applicable. 119 participants were recruited from Arizona State University and a case study was performed individually for five participants of interest. The data analyzed from this study suggests that while appearance-based shame does exist in healthcare spaces, it is not a significant determining factor in patients returning to their physicians. In addition, there was no significant evidence to suggest that patients who do not experience appearance-based shame are either likely or more likely to return to their physician. We hypothesize this could be due to confounding variables such as convenience, accessibility, or insurance limitations which patients may prioritize over feeling ashamed during an appointment. However, more research needs to be conducted to confirm these hypotheses.

Menstrual hygiene management, or MHM, is a concept that concerns girls' and women’s access to the appropriate information and resources to manage menstruation. In December 2012, the Joint Monitoring Program, or JMP, was one of the first organizations to define MHM as a global development goal. Since then, other organizations like WaterAid and the United Nations have expanded MHM’s definition to include menstrual education that is biologically accurate and free of taboo and stigma. Many women in low-income countries lack those necessities for MHM due to high prices of menstrual sanitary products, lack of access to clean water and sanitation facilities, and social stigma surrounding menstruation that prevents it from being talked about. However, as more organizations began to frame MHM as an issue of public concern rather than a woman’s private problem, more researchers, organizations, and governmental bodies have begun to address issues at the root of inadequate MHM.

Mary Coffin Ware Dennett, a supporter of sex education for children in the US in the early twentieth century, wrote The Sex Education of Children: A Book for Parents as a resource for parents teaching their children about sex. Vanguard Press in New York City, New York, published The Sex Education of Children in 1931. Dennett’s book addresses issues that Dennett argued parents should know about sex to provide their children with an accurate portrayal of the topic. In addition to expressing Dennett’s views on sex education, The Sex Education of Children was one of the few works during the early 1900s in the US to advocate for increased communication with children about reproductive health.