Helen Webberley found guilty

[OldCrone]

Just seen on the BBC Wales news that Helen Webberley has been found guilty of providing an unregistered online medical clinic. She'll be sentenced next month.

I feel sorry for the kid. I suppose they'd just like to get on with their life and not be known as 'the child of' or 'the kid who'. What will mummy do when they leave home and have to have a relatively normal life.

I think Jackie has had some benefits from the exposure too.

She had a lot of coaching, opportunities and did media herself following the 'trans teen beauty queen' successes

She did post a month or so ago in support of Mermaids etc and so does in a way remain the 'pin-up' whilst apparently enjoying quite a glamourous lifestyle.

Oh well maybe it's like being a Beckham or kardasian kid - in a bubble without much real life experience. Probably for the best.

It saddens me to see so much ill feeling towards Dr. Webberley.

I am a patient of gendergp and I know first hand the process involved. I can assure everyone that this is not some "hormones by post" service no questions asked. Their process takes a number of weeks to go through, requiring a lot of information, counselling and blood testing.

I know a lot of people don't agree with transgender but to me Dr Webberley provides a vital service to people, like myself, caught up in an NHS system of multi-year delays and utter misery. The media are putting forward one side of a story - please dont judge on what you read.

Dr webberly would have nobody's ire if she didn't prescribe blockers to children and even cross sex hormones. She would likely not have come to the attention of the police either.
She's a zealot and an irresponsible person who is facilitating child abuse.

Even putting aside the trans issue I'm deeply suspicious of any parent who splashes details of their child's life around in public and in the media.

I am a patient of gendergp and I know first hand the process involved. I can assure everyone that this is not some "hormones by post" service no questions asked. Their process takes a number of weeks to go through, requiring a lot of information, counselling and blood testing.

One of Webberley's online businesses was closed due to, among other things, doing a consultation in 17 seconds and having no mechanism to check the identity - and therefore age - of people she was prescribing to.

Here's the CQC report:

www.cqc.org.uk/sites/default/files/new_reports/AAAG2254.pdf

You want to entrust your medical care to someone like that? Madness.

I remember Nick Hornby writing an article about what a loss Dr Andrew Wakefield was to children with autism and their families - that he was immensely caring, intelligent and seemed like an oasis in an incredibly difficult and barrier-filled system. Sadly it didn't change the fact that his views on how to manage and research autism appeared to have become distorted.

I'm glad Dr Webberley is a caring doctor. It unfortunately doesn't change the fact that her practice appears to be overstepping guidelines that are there for a reason. This is a particular risk IMO with clinicians who work separately from big teams. There are different risks with clinicians who do work in big teams - they can hide more easily in a cloud of data, and can get very used to horrific waiting times.

Good. I hope she gets locked up.

wrexhamtrans she had a fair trial, and was found guilty.
All HCPs must follow legal procedures, those laws are there for a reason, to protect patients. You might not have come to any harm as a result of her illegal activities, but other people may not be so lucky.

People who are exploited often are unaware of it.

I was just coming on to reference Andrew Wakefield. He was held up as a hero at the time.

Crackpot magnetism - if someone holds one absurd belief they're more likely to hold others too.

I don't doubt that she was providing a service that people liked. But the rules are there to make sure the risk of harm is minimised to anyone using the service. And frankly, breaking the law whilst her medical practice is under investigation by the GMC, is a pretty big clue that she lacks a sound ethical compass and is likely to be a danger to patients.

I hope her husband has a good lawyer.

There are people who fantasise about being disabled or having an amputation - of having massive boobs and bum - of being taller, shorter, looking like Barbie (or ken), or even looking like a cat or a snake.

If you have the money to pay, you will find a doctor who will piss on their hippocratic oath and do as you wish on the grounds of 'mental and emotional wellbeing'.

I imagine that before his crimes came to light, many people said Harold Shipman was really good to their nans.

I used to work with someone who had had shipman as her GP. She said he was a good dr ‘what, apart from killing all those people?’ I said. ‘Well, yes’ said she. It just shows you, doesn’t it 🤔

Just sidetracking a little (but running parallel to the discussion)..

I don't know how many people are aware but "bridging hormones" can be readily prescribed by a "friendly GP" whilst a patient is awaiting referral to a GIC. This has been going on since GMC guidance came out in around 2016 www.gponline.com/gps-initiate-hormone-therapy-transgender-patients-says-gmc/article/1388228

As I understand it, the current wait for a 1st appt at the "big GIC in London" is approximately 12 months+

There is an implicit knowledge in the "trans" community that "to get on 'the 'mones', just go see your GP and they'll sort you out". It's not exactly difficult to convince your average family doctor - who doesn't necessarily have the specialist knowledge of trans / gd / whatever. Just thrust the guidance in front of them and pretty much walk out with boxes of pills.

GPs are more scared of patients self-medicating from backstreet internet retailers, so they tend to capitulate.

Of course I wouldn't blatantly say that anyone who claims they're trans but fancies a set of boobs because their AGP is running rampant could do this... but yeah - see the loophole?

So it's not just Webberley that's complicit in the dishing out of hormones with no background... it's MUCH, MUCH bigger.

See, when I went to my GP with my "Shania Twain Moment", I got bundled off to a psych - who diagnosed GD, then off to the GIC for TWO diagnoses of the same before I even went near an endocrinologist. I have it in triplicate, in writing lol.

Joking aside - if you know which buttons to press, you can walk in and out of your GP the same as if you wanted some painkillers for your bad back.

Food for thought...

I live in Wales. I go to an LGBT group. I've met two youngsters - under 16 - who were getting prescriptions from HW's clinic. I raised a safeguarding concern with HIW.

I also know adults who are being prescribed hormones by GPs. To me, this is less problematic as they at least have the benefit of more life experience and are better able to make life changing decisions. I'm really worried about vulnerable teens seeing people like HW. I hope they throw the book at her. But unless they remove the prescribing rights of everyone in her clinic there are ways round it, it seems.

Bridging hormones only applies in England.

If like me you live in North Wales you have to travel to Charing Cross and expect a 2 year wait

I live in England also - but the point I am making is that obtaining hormones via a GP with no additional consultation are too easy PERIOD.

There is:

Minimal discussion with a "non specialist" care provider
No psychiatric evaluation
No official diagnosis of gender dysphoria
No physiological checks unless baseline hormone levels are taken (just kidney/liver function tests AFTER the fact)

There has to absolutely be that diagnosis of gender dysphoria from a specialist care provider plus a visit to an endocrinologist prior to prescription.

Call me a transmedicalist / truscum / whatever, I don't care - but there have to be rigorous checks and diagnosable dysphoria before hormones are prescribed.

At the moment that's NOT happening and it's too easy for any male with AGP or fetishistic transvestism (for example) to walk into a GP and obtain drugs.

The whole damn system has caved in on itself trying to "appease the feels" and it's lost the stringent criteria it once had.

And it's no wonder the private GICs are making a quick buck because it £££ in their pocket sanctioned by the GMC who have "relaxed the rules".

There is a doctor very similar to Dr Webberley who treats patients with a condition I have. To many in the community she is an absolute heroine. She listens and is compassionate and (for a fat fee) used to prescribe all sorts.

She was investigated formally and came very close to being struck off. People were devastated.

Actually, having a little (basic) scientific knowledge and a healthy dose of cynicism I could see she was linking autism to MMR and telling people all sorts of other rubbish about their health. It was largely pseudoscience. I know one person who paid her £23,000 for some useless treatment.

Sometimes when you're very vulnerable and desperate it's very hard to see you're being taken for a ride. These doctors can seem to be saviours. I don't doubt it seems like Webberley was helping people but she really wasn't.

Hamster im not sure its changed that much. My first husband was prescribed hormones following either one or two sessions with a gender specialist in 1992 or 93. He met me in 95 having stopped the hormones a few weeks after starting them. After stopping the hormones he had quite a lot of facial surgery to look more masculine i slent large chunks of our honeymoon putting makeup on him (very dull resort) but other than that he was always the most testosterone laden partner i ever had. From a relationship point of view he had more red flags than Stalin's funeral, but as a highly inteligent and manipulative individual he just decided what he wanted and went and got it. It takes a very experienced and well supported doctor to resist that kind of personality, who will kick off enormously (or just go doctor shopping)if they are not given what they want.

wrexhamtrans

If like me you live in North Wales you have to travel to Charing Cross and expect a 2 year wait

So in line with the waiting time for life-saving mental health services then? I travelled 200 miles weekly for eight weeks because I had joined a waiting list for CBT, moved away a year later to escape an abusive OH, and then was forwarded a letter from my old address telling me when my therapy would start. I had a choice: travel to the appointments, or wait another year. I went into debt to afford the train fares. The problems you are describing have nothing to do with you being trans and everything to do with successive governments undermining, underfunding, and now openly dismantling our health service.

I am a depressive with three suicide attempts and uncountable self-harm scars to my name. Despite my life being at risk from suicide, I didn't go to illegal online psychiatrists to get psych meds without a formal diagnosis, even though my third suicide attempt was what put me on the CBT waiting list in the first place. There were times when I was waiting when I became convinced that I didn't have depression, that I was bipolar instead. Yet I didn't go online and get lithium from an illegal provider, I discussed my thoughts about my diagnosis with my GP and had my SSRIs changed (several times, in fact, with each change requiring standby support from a 24/7 crisis mental health team because the first few weeks of new meds poses a huge suicide risk). If I had obtained illegal lithium, I could have done myself immeasurable harm.

The point I'm not making at all well is that high suicide risk does not trump the need for proper medical assessment and supervision. There is also the possibility that self-diagnosis could be wrong, in which case hormones would be the wrong treatment. As a teen, I was pretty sure I should have been born a boy because I didn't like "girl things" (makeup, boy bands) and liked some "boy things" (problem-solving, meccano) and I hated how I was objectified as a girl and wanted not to be a girl to escape objectification. If I was a teen now, I would be suspected of being trans and would probably think myself that I was trans, when in fact I was traumatised by boys who had sexually assaulted me and regularly beaten me up. A thorough evaluation by a psychiatrist trained to look for sexual assault history would uncover that, an illegal online clinic would not.

If you have suicidal thoughts then you need to talk to someone: Samaritans 116 123 When I had been discharged from crisis mental health team and in hindsight shouldn't have been discharged quite so soon, the Sams were there.

I don't know how many people are aware but "bridging hormones" can be readily prescribed by a "friendly GP" whilst a patient is awaiting referral to a GIC. This has been going on since GMC guidance came out in around 2016 www.gponline.com/gps-initiate-hormone-therapy-transgender-patients-says-gmc/article/1388228

The utter lack of due diligence in Maria Miller’s report has a lot to answer for. The GMC guidance references it.