Gender-affirming surgery linked to better mental health

[Shizuku]

www.nbcnews.com/feature/nbc-out/gender-affirming-surgery-linked-better-mental-health-study-finds-n1266033

“This study adds to a growing body of evidence showing affirmation in all forms can be life-saving for trans and gender-diverse people,” said lead author Anthony Almazan, a fourth-year medical student at Harvard Medical School. “Policies that limit access to care can put lives at risk. Our evidence shows we should be expanding gender-affirming care, not limiting it.”

Walt Heyer literally had sex affirmation surgery.

And lived as a trans woman for 8 years.

Don't re-write history. Don't question his gender identity.

@Doyoumind

Take these findings out to trans people then, Shiz. Use your time positively to support the trans community where you can have a useful impact. Stop 'educating' feminists in a different country from you and focus on your community.

Ironic comment on a feminism forum largely dedicated to discussing trans people.

@FightingTheFoo

Walt Heyer literally had sex affirmation surgery.

And lived as a trans woman for 8 years.

Don't re-write history. Don't question his gender identity.

I'm literally quoting his autobiography. If you disagree with it, take it up with him.

And if you don't like the Federalist's reporting, perhaps you'll prefer this article on the exact same topic:

https://bescofield.substack.com/p/portlands-ohsu-hospital-covers-up

I am sorry, you only have to see the Oprah Winfrey interview with E Page to see how poor the mental health is of some of these very damaged people.

Why is surgery - radical removal of key body parts - the answer to someone having poor mental health.

Talking therapy that deals with the mind. Therapy needs to improve health, not remove healthy body parts.

I'm literally quoting his autobiography.

He had "gender affirmation surgery" - the same kind you talk about in your OP - and lived as a transgender woman for 8 years.

I think the term you're looking for is women's rights. Where a push against women's rights is being made, we discuss it. That's when relevant threads about trans people come in. You starting a thread about trans people's mental health is not about women's rights. The fact you won't grasp this, having been told many times suggests you really have no interest in feminist debate.

ajp.psychiatryonline.org/doi/10.1176/appi.ajp.2020.1778correction

Can this please be moved to LGBT part of the forum? It doesn't have anything to do with feminism. If people want elective surgery, go for it. If this should be paid for by NHS, is another debate. Maybe that is the part you want to discuss with feminists? If plastic surgery for mental distress should be funded before female healthcare and pre natal care? Maybe we could first ensure pregnant mums to be, especially mums to be of colour, aren't at such a high risk of dying before or during labour?

Remember multiple news sources reported Turban’s study as showing puberty blockers as being helpful, even though it actually showed those who had been on puberty blockers were twice as likely to be hospitalised for a suicide attempt.

If I'm not mistaken, this study uses exactly the same dataset that Turban used to extract his dubious results from.

I'm surprised that no one in the years since this dataset was generated has thought to ask this question of it, before a fourth-year medical student tried it. And by 'surprised' I mean 'disbelieving'. Without looking at it, I expect this paper to be some kind of statistical shambles that even Turban would have been ashamed to put his name to.

But I can't be arsed to read it, so I'm reserving my judgement. I'm basing my expectations on my knowledge of what research on this topic is usually like.

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So abortions should be banned too because this women tragically died?

Sick straw man argument. Do better.

@FightingTheFoo

I would also advise everyone to watch this clip the whole way through - especially the bit where the surgeons - widely considered to be the "best" gender affirmation surgeons in the US - are arguing in the operating theatre over what to cut

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=-bCVA9q3RBc

Bloody hell, how many ops has jazz had? Were there more after this?

Also how often do surgeons ask for hugs from their patients? Is that normal?

Linking the thread as it seems there's disagreement

Sex Reassignment Treatment Does Not Improve Mental Health – Journal Issues Correction www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3988886-Sex-Reassignment-Treatment-Does-Not-Improve-Mental-Health-Journal-Issues-Correction

Also, can't currently find it but longitudinal studies are needed as there's a good talk by a transwoman who had surgery in the 70's I think, and now regrets a lifetime of hormones due to how it's affected bones etc.

That research was over 2 years only.

"Control group" is pointless as all the narrative online is that their dysphoria will be cured by surgery.

I'm afraid that simply doesn't match with my - admittedly limited - clinical experience.

The surgery isn't a single operation. It's a series of procedures that are often painful and don't always achieve the perfect desired result, cosmetically or functionally.

The small number of people I have cared for have all had complex psychological issues and did not receive the mental health support they needed. The impact of their surgery not meeting their (often unrealistic) expectations, had a further, devastating impact on them.

This is a feminism board to discuss women's rights, but I can never forget the unnecessary harms done to fragile individuals who were to all intents and purposes tricked into having surgery to fix a problem that never existed.

@allmywhat

Remember multiple news sources reported Turban’s study as showing puberty blockers as being helpful, even though it actually showed those who had been on puberty blockers were twice as likely to be hospitalised for a suicide attempt.

If I'm not mistaken, this study uses exactly the same dataset that Turban used to extract his dubious results from.

I'm surprised that no one in the years since this dataset was generated has thought to ask this question of it, before a fourth-year medical student tried it. And by 'surprised' I mean 'disbelieving'. Without looking at it, I expect this paper to be some kind of statistical shambles that even Turban would have been ashamed to put his name to.

But I can't be arsed to read it, so I'm reserving my judgement. I'm basing my expectations on my knowledge of what research on this topic is usually like.

Yes I think it is the same data set. If I can be arsed I will analyse the full data. I am expecting it to be bullshit, and someone will likely get there before me, maybe Malcolm Clark or Michael Biggs after they picked apart Turban’s pile of crap.

And to demonstrate why a year is no good at all to make any judgment on success:

Around the end of that first year post-surgery, something started happening: My brain was maturing. I thought about how I’d gotten where I was, and gave myself questions to contemplate. A big one was: “What makes me a man?”

Keira Bell talking about after her mastectomy .

This “study” just contributes to the idea that glossing over the long term realities by finding false short term “gains” is deemed good medicine in this field.

As people have mentioned, this doesn't really appear to impact on women's rights.

If some people can truly benefit from this type of surgery, OK, great. (But maybe we shouldn't rush to judgment just over one particular study.) Of course it wouldn't mean anyone could really change sex.

A study that showed mental health benefits from trans-girls/women participating in female sports would be more controversial.

Even if there were genuine benefits to the trans-person, you can still I think quite correctly argue that it wouldn't matter and it's simply unfair to take opportunities away from women.

Why are there two threads on this, both posted by the same person.
?

Yes I think it is the same data set. If I can be arsed I will analyse the full data. I am expecting it to be bullshit, and someone will likely get there before me, maybe Malcolm Clark or Michael Biggs after they picked apart Turban’s pile of crap.

I succumbed to curiosity and went to read it, but it's not on scihub so I can't get too sucked in, thankfully!

An article linked above says Adjustments were also made for sociodemographic factors including age, education level, employment status, household income, and race.

Is it actually possible that they didn't control for sex? Even if they had to call it 'sex assigned at birth' or whatever. If they didn't then that's all the information we need to conclude the study is trash. They should really have sex-disaggregated the data, but not to even control for sex? Yikes.

The other thing it looks like they missed is age at transition- they may be effectively comparing early transitioners (who are likely to have already had surgery) to later transitioners and finding that the later transitioners are less stable.

How about this @Shizuku

The 2 threads are about different papers.

The mostly recently published one and the topic of the one in the OP's linked news item is the secondary analysis of data from the 2015 survey which was conducted in the US (details above in posts from me).

The second study in OP's other thread is a separate population study in Sweden which had to undergo a substantial correction and weakned its original conclusions:

Given that the study used neither a prospective cohort design nor a randomized controlled trial design, the conclusion that “the longitudinal association between gender-affirming surgery and lower use of mental health treatment lends support to the decision to provide gender-affirming surgeries to transgender individuals who seek them” is too strong. Finally, although the percentage of individuals with a gender incongruence diagnosis who had received gender-affirming surgical treatments [is wrongly reported in the text.]

Correction: ajp.psychiatryonline.org/doi/10.1176/appi.ajp.2020.1778correction

Uncorrected original: ajp.psychiatryonline.org/doi/10.1176/appi.ajp.2019.19010080

I'm deeply unsettled that people who don't understand the details of either of these studies nonetheless seem confident that they can use them to talk to/counsel people about relevant issues in their (professional) capacity in what seems to be something akin to a shared decision-making process.

Gender affirming surgery = gender changing surgery.
But as gender is a social construct and changing sex isn’t possible anyway ?”?.

I couldn't tell from the link but has this been peer reviewed in any way?