What you all said was coming

I watched a documentary called What is a Woman? this week. It makes me think this man has a legitimate case. The reason for this is that all trans surgery is experimental, with no baseline level of care. This means the surgery can differ and there is no standardised quality control. The recipient of the treatment signs a disclaimer. However, in this country disclaimers cannot protect a provider of a service from gross negligence that causes death or serious harm.

Gender affirmation inherently promotes the route to surgery, instead of supporting someone in unpicking their dysphoria and seeing whether they can come to terms with their biological reality. They are then not told about the myriad of harms that are frequent results of this treatment. For example, someone who undergoes these treatments is not only left infertile, but is also left unable to have a satisfying sexual relationship. They often have serious problems with normal bodily functions like going to the loo, chronic pain, scarring, repeated infections that become resistant to antibiotics and can be a death sentence, a statistically increased risk of suicide after surgery and much more. In short, many people who undergo this sort of surgery will live shorter lives because of it. All of the above is surely negligent.

That seems a very.... hands-off approach, not at all what I'd envisaged from mishy's description.

Sorry I'm not going to discuss that on here.

I used to know two people who went through with this, my understanding was a psychiatrist had to agree before they could get the operation. Maybe it has been made easier and more likely that people can get inappropriate surgery. The two people I knew were very different, one a well respected professional and I think everyone was surprised the other had a quite chaotic lifestyle and people had generally felt it was likely to happen.

It must be very difficult to deal with for everyone concerned.

I don't know, they did take his penis and testicles off. How does this operation exist for non medical reasons in the first place? How does someone who has autism, with mental health issues, end up on the table? What is the path they followed to get there, when the NHS are the ones who are actually qualified and experienced and shouldn't be removing people's genitals for non-medical reasons.

People suggesting NHS is affirmative only care are dead wrong. Anyone going through that system is assessed and challenged by psychs over a number of years. Two separate psychs have to agree a person is able to consent and psychologically fit for surgery.

Really? Where is that clear on the Indigo website which for genital surgery says:

”For genital or ‘bottom’ surgery we are unable to refer you directly as this requires two letters of recommendation. However, we can provide one letter and the Nottingham Centre for Transgender Health is able to provide the other after an assessment with them. This can be done remotely and you do not need to necessarily travel to Nottingham for this. This process is in line with current national guidelines around surgical referrals.”

indigogenderservice.uk/our-services/services-we-offer/surgeries

Indigo makes it clear how straightforward their letter of recommendation is and for the one via Nottingham Centre you don’t even need to be seen in person to get their letter.

People really should have a good look at Indigo and understand the model for gender affirming healthcare.

Yep!

It is as inconceivable for him not to have thought about it a it was for Keira Bell. But women here lept to support her. Women here understood her pain, her confusion, her anger and didn't try to talk it away.

Why this young man went through are the same systemic failings, the same fears, the same psychological disturbance and the same physical failings. None of which are lesser because he is make and, for some reason, some here hold him to a higher standard of self care and knowledge!

Shit like this is what gives those who mock MN FWR good reason!

But presumably your husband isn't in a 'mentally unwell, obsessive state', as this man described himself at the time he sought gender treatment?

Yes, he's a victim of society and his upbringing, but not of the NHS.

Absolutely, but that approach is predicated on the principle that the patient has sufficient capacity to make that choice.

Someone who is severely mentally unwell does not have that capacity, and needs to be protected from making poor choices that cause profound and long-lasting damage. In exactly the same way that we intervene with other conditions that cause someone to self harm.

I have no doubt he was warned about the affects of surgery and the fact he was seeing a psychiatrist indicates he was having therapy about his gender issues. He had been taking hormones and living as a female. He wasn't an impressionable teen and I am sympathetic to the situation he is in, but hope the suit fails. I hope though it's a lesson to the NHS not to follow the craziness of gender reassignment without far more research and I'm angry about the shite in the media about gender 'dysphoria'

FWR have been saying for years now, that the affirmation approach will lead to tragedies and that people who are undergoing any surgery need to understand that there is no way that they can actually change sex, it's just plastic surgery at best.

FWR people have taken to the streets/campaigns to explain that the NHS is just giving surgeries to people without the adequate mental health exploration and they are being sold a lie. To try and get people to listen to what is going on - right now - in the NHS.

FWR often mention the dichotomy that the NHS won't take action for women who are desperate for medical reasons to have operations that they give to 'gender disphoric' people with no medical reason whatsoever.

FWR are continuously monitored and if the monitors deem that we have overstepped or committed wrong think are so powerful that they can get people banned for life from here, for pointing this all out.

This was always going to be the culmination, someone was always going to be the first case to take the NHS to court for what they are doing and lo and behold - the people that are spending all their time telling us to 'be nice' are sticking the knife into this man that he knew what he was getting into.

Honestly, some of the responses on here have been so utterly vile I just cannot get my head around them.

Yes, I'm genuinely glad that most people have a positive outcome after this kind of surgery. But these questions really do need to be asked.

Weighing up risks and benefits of all surgeries is actually not black and white. There was a great Panorama about how risks of cancer treatments are presented to patients and the reality behind it. I think actually GRS is on the extreme end of the same spectrum, it's more apparent because the body seems healthy and it's to treat a mental problem in this case. (I'm talking about adults here - children and adolescents are a separate case imo).

I understand the comments saying he was an adult and made the choice. But I believe that he was mentally unwell and in the grip of a social contagion when he made this decision. And - more importantly - he shouldn't have been allowed to make this choice. The doctors and surgeons have a clear ethical duty to "do no harm". This is harm: clear and lasting, irreversible harm. Everyone involved in this - everyone - bears some responsibility. But only the young man himself is being punished.

Not up to me to advise the NHS. Given regrets are extremely low, I'm not sure there is anything for them to do here. Like all surgeries, they have regret rates. I'm sure the NHS applies the same analysis they do to other surgeries around regret rates.

No system is fail safe. There will always be sub optimal outcomes for some people. That is sad.

In other words: it sucks to be a detransitioner. Oh well, what can you do.

I haven't read the whole thread but I agree with this. I simply don't understand why gender dysphoria has been singled out for an affirmation-based approach when comparable conditions are (correctly, imo) recognised as having their roots in mental illness or neurodiversity, and managed and treated accordingly.

Sorry I haven't read the whole thread yet but isn't that whole article based on a tweet? It might not even be true.

Sometimes the NHS gives you the positives and negatives and you decide. As an example my husband has a very painful back condition. I don't mean he has backache I mean sometimes he screams with the pain, sometimes he's bedridden not because being in bed is comfortable but because he can't move. His specialist told him he could do surgery which would probably reduce or even remove the pain but it would also mean he was likely to be paralysed from the waist down, be incontinent, impotent. It was his decision once he was presented with the information. Neither option seemed very appealing but he decided against surgery. He lives with the pain, it was his decision.

Seems uncessarily aggressive @xogossipgirlxo

Nope, clearly I don't think surgery is free and I'm sure other people don't either.

But the old cries that someone shouldn't get surgery for XYZ because another surgery is considered more worthy is a very simplistic understanding of how the NHS works.

Unfortunately this case will be just one of many over the next few years/ decades. Mental or pyschological issues are being 'treated' with permanent physical changes. It is and will be a future crisis.

People suggesting NHS is affirmative only care are dead wrong. Anyone going through that system is assessed and challenged by psychs over a number of years. Two separate psychs have to agree a person is able to consent and psychologically fit for surgery.

Plenty of detransitioners say they weren't challenged in any meaningful way. Have a look for Sinead Watson on Youtube.

@MishyJDI Do you think the number of regretters will remain low, given the 4000% increase in young women identifying as transgender and the move towards an affirmation only treatment policy?

@EdgeOfACoin Not up to me to advise the NHS. Given regrets are extremely low, I'm not sure there is anything for them to do here. Like all surgeries, they have regret rates. I'm sure the NHS applies the same analysis they do to other surgeries around regret rates.

No system is fail safe. There will always be sub optimal outcomes for some people. That is sad.

People suggesting NHS is affirmative only care are dead wrong. Anyone going through that system is assessed and challenged by psychs over a number of years. Two separate psychs have to agree a person is able to consent and psychologically fit for surgery.

It is far from an easy process, and is life-saving for those who undergo it. Not something anyone does lightly, as it is pretty intensive surgery, and not without risks.

Quite. If Advanced Search weren't quite so broken, I'd normally recommend that people look for previous threads that address this topic/research but, in this case, yes, looking at more recent figures, and certainly post the discussion around ROGD plus various social phenomena, would be helpful.

As far as I am aware, it's a very out of date statistic.