NHS told: give trans patients equal access to fertility service

[miri1985]

www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/aug/04/nhs-trans-patients-equal-access-fertility-services

Anyone betting the EHRC don't take the same action to force the NHS to give women access to laser or electrolysis brought on by PCOS or menopause

R0wantrees

I'm sorry you're having a rough one.

ESRC seem to be funding quite a few things like this recently.

Masculine women are trans

I might actually fall into that category: I studied a subject at university that is traditionally male-dominated, work in a male-dominated sector, have no interest in children, am not at all interested in being fluffy or coy, was brought up by my father and so was not socialised in a traditional female way, never wear high heels etc.

OTOH, I wear makeup (and occasionally scent) to work and only ever wear dresses and skirts. (Though the latter is because I have a long torso and find trousers uncomfortable.)

I also have Asperger's Syndrome, which is considered by some experts to exemplify an extreme male brain.

Not only that - I don't identify as female.

Thanks heresy , this particular lobbying focus is far to close to personal experiences.

'too' even!

At the moment I am listed as an organ donor for any part that is needed but I am very tempted to change that so say that I do not consent to my uterus and/or ovaries being used for donation after my death. The way things are going is chilling.

NotBad bluescreen your post doesn't make sense. Can you explain?

Sorry, that was meant to be heavy irony. I don't think this policy makes sense at all. On the one hand you have 'trans' children whose puberty may be arrested and who may never be able to use fertility treatment, trans adults who are transitioning and may want to bank sperm or eggs before undergoing surgery or hormone therapy, and AGPs who want to do the whole Danish Girl thing. On the other hand you have infertile couples, and people about to undergo radiotherapy or other harmful treatment. And you have uber-stretched NHS resources. My sympathy lies with those whose need isn't merely self-identified.

If we agree that being trans is an illness, then yes, it makes sense to offer gamete preservation in line with other illnesses that cause fertility loss (either due to the illness itself or the treatment of the ilness).

However, if being trans is not an illness (as stated by Theresa May recently) there is no reason to offer parity of treatment.

Unless of course, two trans people in a couple are of the same birth sex, in which case they should be entitled to the same sort of fertility help as other same sex couples.

As mentioned before, this stuff is all subject to postcode lotteries anyway, regardless of cause, so I’m not sure how much difference this will make in the real world.

Pressures on the NHS mean less and less assistance is available for those struggling to conceive, so it’s more likely that help will fall for everyone, rather than significantly rise for trans people.

R0wan

Thanks bowl apologies for my misunderstanding. Think we are in violent agreement!

I highly doubted that any IVF funding will be available on the NHS in 5 years time anyway, but I suspect this will be the death knell and accelerate it faster

(Our - unsuccessful - IVF was privately funded, we didn't get anything on the NHS)

As mentioned before, this stuff is all subject to postcode lotteries anyway, regardless of cause, so I’m not sure how much difference this will make in the real world.

Im less sure that the postcode lottery effect would exist.

R0 - do you think that being legally obliged to offer a more consistent standard of care countrywide would end up helping less people in the long term?

(Recent Manchester story for context - not trans related: www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/free-ivf-nhs-scrapped-trafford-14428791)

Oops - www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/free-ivf-nhs-scrapped-trafford-14428791

Is it a human right to have children?

There are enough humans on the planet to keep the human race alive. If nature says no for whatever reason then is it ok to just go ahead anway?

I am aware my stance will cause a huge backlash. To be clear my fist born child was 6 lost babies and 1 still birth later. I am not insensative. Just pragmatic.

We may be at crossed purposes Betty, I disn't express mine very well!

My belief is that if there are newly drawn up fertility saving protocols, I think they would be less likely to have a 'postcode lottery effect' than for example the fertility saving treatments for people diagnosed with cancer.
This would be in part that as they are new, they would be adopted across all trusts. Additionally, the awareness and advocacy enjoyed by the transgender community simply does not exist for people newly diagnosed with cancer.
As I described and was echoed by the studies and campaign I linked previously, the situation for females diagnosed with cancer is very, very different to those who are embarking on medical treatments associated with gender transition.

There are enough humans on the planet to keep the human race alive. If nature says no for whatever reason then is it ok to just go ahead anway?

I am aware my stance will cause a huge backlash. To be clear my fist born child was 6 lost babies and 1 still birth later. I am not insensative. Just pragmatic.

I'm sorry for your losses

Maybe it is against nature that we had IVF but if we'd have been able to have a child then he or she would have been so deeply loved and wanted

We took no public funds for our IVF

I took no public funds for the antenatal care and births I never had

8 million IVF babies have been born worldwide in the last 40 years since Louise Brown's birth just over 40 years ago. Maybe they were also all against nature but I have no doubt many very very happy families are so very glad that they were

If nature says no for whatever reason then is it ok to just go ahead anway?

Where does that stop though? If I hadn’t had a c section me and the boy would be dead. I’d imagine about 20% of us have had antibiotics for something that stood a chance of killing them if we hadn’t.

I think what’s unfair is the postcode lottery aspect of it. Would it be fairer to fund say three cycles nationwide on a sliding fee scale maybe? So people are contributing according to ability to pay and everyone has the same access?

Postcode lotteries for any health care seem wrong to me. It’s a national health service and peiole shpuld revieve on the basis of clinical need, not postcode.

Then for one group who are voluntarily Giving up fertility to be prioritised over cancer patients who have no choice? If that happened it’d be very wrong indeed.

We had IVF as an option. I said no. It caused a few issues in our relationship.

I now have 4 children twins were our last addition. Delivered by csec.
I never saw having children as a right. I decided trying and possibly failing was what we had to do. So thats what we did.

I cant describe my mindset properly without sounding like a complete cow. I just have a different opinion.

Congratulations on your 4 children

I'm delighted you were successful

Unfortunately not all of us can conceive naturally

I'm glad that you have your family

Not all of us are so lucky

I was not rubbing anyones face in it. I just wanted to be honest.
I felt the same way when I had no children.

Blue screen, yes, I had to fill in my donor info recently and excluded uterus and ovaries.

@OddBoots & @Jamieandwordswo do you know how to edit your registration for organ donation?

I'm happy to help people once I'm gone, no problem with an alcoholic getting me liver but someone with a fetish getting my uterus... not so much, though I wouldn't deny a woman with medical issues

Mine was in the forms when I changed GPs.

The UK charity supporting research into womb transplantation is specifically founded to "enable women born without a womb, or who have lost their womb, to have a child"

It specifically refers to the 1 in 5000 women who are born without a womb - the majority of these will be due to syndromes like MRKH. That is certainly the case in the UK surrogacy community: there are women with uterine factor infertility, women who have uterine factor infertility due to not being born with a womb in the first place, and women who've lost their wombs to cancer. There are also an increasing amount of same sex male couples pursuing surrogacy.

I am not aware of whether the charity plans to change its mission statement to encompass those who underwent gender reassignment who were born male.

wombtransplantuk.org/about/why

42 women so far worldwide have undergone womb transplants. To my knowledge none of these women were transwomen.

www.bbc.com/news/health-44360786

Out of interest the first womb transplant baby was born via a womb transplant from a living donor. The donor was a friend of the recipient, who was in her 60s and post menopausal.

www.bbc.com/news/health-29485996