Tavistock puberty blocker study published

[PaleBlueMoonlight]

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-55282113

Finds 43/44 (98%) progress from PBS to cross sex hormones

"Parents reported a significant decrease in well being"

Total mystery why GIDS chose not to present this quality data to the court

Am reading paper now:

^B. Psychological criteria

1. has been seen by the GIDS for at least 6 months and attended at least 4 interviews for assessment

and therapeutic exploration of their gender identity development.^

So PBs after 6 months and four appointments - that seems quite short?

Interesting, body dysmorphia unrelated to gender dysphoria excluded patients from study

[quote gardenbird48]omg - this is crazy.

I haven't had a chance to read it fully yet but this link is slightly buried in the article - an interesting snapshot of the internal goings on in 2015.

tavistockandportman.nhs.uk/documents/142/board-papers-2015-06.pdf[/quote]
I've just had a quick look at that. In her report to the board meeting, Polly Carmichael says that preliminary results of the study are in Appendix 7. In Appendix 7 is this table about autism traits. Does anyone know what these figures mean?

It looks as though at the start of the trial, 46.7% of the children were showing moderate to severe autism traits, and after 1 year on puberty blockers, that figure rose to 58.6%.

I hope I've got that wrong. Can someone familiar with the SRS test for autism make sense of this table?

This is the data for changes in dysphoria score and body image perception. They didn't do a formal statistical analysis (I wonder why ...), but it is clear that the scores do not change meaningfully.

So blockers have no effect on dysphoria it body image perception. The cost-benefit analysis of these things is looking worse and worse

Am I being really stupid here, or just stuck at O level biology from 30-odd years ago, but how can pre-pubescent patients be encouraged to store gametes? I thought production / maturation of them was the whole point of puberty!?

@DannyGlickWindowTapping

Am I being really stupid here, or just stuck at O level biology from 30-odd years ago, but how can pre-pubescent patients be encouraged to store gametes? I thought production / maturation of them was the whole point of puberty!?

I was about to ask exactly the same question!

Echoing what others have said.. how the has this report not been available?? This surely borders on misconduct. Tye court of appeal will hopefully not look kindly on the fact that this was withheld from the judicial review.

I'm just speechless.

Except to observe that there are clearly huge battles going on within the BBC over gender/trans issues.

@MillieEpple

What does 'no change in psychological function mean' I cant work out if this is good in that it doesnt change development or bad in that they still have psychological issues after treatment

I was confused by this too. In fact a few bits confused me.

This looks like contempt of court to me, publishing it the day after the hearing. I'd like go think the Court of Appeal will take very dim view of this.

@Signalbox

It strikes me that the Tavi were in a unique position to have done multiple studies and collect multiple data over the last 10 years. It is staggering that this study is all they have come up with. No wonder the judges were "surprised".

Exactly. As a specialist service, it was/is up to them to research the evidence base for their work. It’s damning and wonder when will get into medical negligence discussions.

This seems like a very limited, even meaningless study. Are many of the effect both psychological and physical not more likely to become apparent over tens of years, rather than just 3?

I was confused by this too. In fact a few bits confused me.

Me three! I don't know if I'm a wally, or it's poorly written. Especially the part where it mentions findings from this study differing from the Dutch one, and then it carries on and it's not clear to me which study they're talking about

@NancyDrawed

page 10 The implicationsof treatment for fertility werediscussed at the first and second medical visits and all young people were urged to consider storing gametes before starting GnRHa

(Bearing in mind that the age of children recruited to this study were between 12 and 15)

If they're urging the children to store gametes before commencing puberty blockers, they don't seem to be viewing the blockers as a 'pause' so much as the first step on the road to CSH.

Not disclosing this to the court will reflect very badly on the Tavistock. I also think it buries at least one of the grounds for appeal as there is a clear path from blockers to cross sex hormones.

What does 'no change in psychological function mean'
I cant work out if this is good in that it doesnt change development or bad in that they still have psychological issues after treatment

I don't think it means all that much and I don't think the study tells us much really, because they only followed up patients for 1-3 years whilst on puberty blockers. We really want to know the effect on psychological function after taking CSH ... and a good few years down the line, into adulthood.

We also want data for a control group who didn't have puberty blockers or CSH.

@Imnobody4

This looks like contempt of court to me, publishing it the day after the hearing. I'd like go think the Court of Appeal will take very dim view of this.

Probably a daft question, but will they be made aware of this?

I think this from MrGHardy needs saying again and again and again.

(Lack of improvement from Gener Dysphoria) Well it is a self fulfilling prophecy. You don't allow the child to develop normally and mature, you perpetually keep them in their dysphoric state.

Bump

Would you like to see an echo chamber?

Here you go:

twitter.com/MyWebDoctorUK/status/1337509321190625283

I would love to see Webberley present her data.

So did they have this data but didn't give it to the court?
And released it a week after the judgment?
Sorry ive had a drink and will have to come back to this tomorrow as all I can muster so far is fucking hell.
Those poor kids.
When will the osteoporosis start showing up?

Trans twitter is coalescing around a response to this problematic paper: the Tavistock are so good at identifying "trans kids" that of course nearly all of the children moved seamlessly from puberty blockers to cross-sex hormones.

Any child starting cross-sex hormone treatment is itself proof that the child is trans.

As others have said:

PBs are not given as a ‘pause button’ to ensure children make the right choice for them. They are given to “trans” kids’’ to cement in dysphoria.