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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

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Original poster

NHS women's health survey

19 replies

KitchenDancefloor · 28/12/2023 19:11

Not sure the point of this thread other than the need to rant.

Being a good citizen and wanting to improve local women's health and wellbeing services, I spent 10 mins filling in an online survey.

Fine.

Not great having to think about all the negative and traumatic things that have happened in my experiences with maternity and GP services, but if it helps improve things then I'm happy to do so.

Only to get to the last page on demographics to be asked my sex (not gender, so good start). Bearing in mind this is a survey on WOMEN'S health the options are:

  • male (including trans male)
  • female (including trans female)
  • other
  • prefer not to say

I used the other box to express my displeasure of filling in a survey which is a waste of time.

Can't we be allowed anything for ourselves?

OP posts:
MrsOvertonsWindow · 28/12/2023 20:34

Rant away OP. The inability to correctly sex those completing this renders the results invalid.
The colonisation of the NHS by the terminally stupid seems endemic.

NoBinturongsHereMate · 28/12/2023 20:49

Is a trans female the same as a trans woman, or a(n actual) female who is trans? Do the people analysing the survey know? Certainly a significant proportion of those filling it in won't.

Garbage in, garbage out.

howdoesatoastermaketoast · 28/12/2023 21:08

the message it sends is we don't know much about women's experiences with the nhs, we are quite determined this doesn't change.

popebishop · 28/12/2023 21:08

Trans male suggests someone whose sex is male, even if they're a woman? But on the other hand the NHS constantly muddle up sex and gender so perhaps they mean trans man, even though being a man or woman has nothing to do with sex?

I genuinely don't know what they are asking there.

Melroses · 28/12/2023 21:13

No I can't work out what they mean by "male (including trans male)" either.

They need to start putting in definitions - even activists come up with lots of different meanings for trans anything.

They are supposed to work to guidelines where it is understood by the majority of the population 🤷‍♀️

IwantToRetire · 28/12/2023 21:26

Oh dear, I almost wished I hadn't clicked on this.

Apart from the whole nonsensical question and using meaningless gobbligook words, it undermines the validity of the survey.

There is a perfectly valid reason to find out for instance the experience of trans people of the NHS.

But whether that is good or bad, has no relevance to biological females experience of the NHS.

I know we are all meant to love the NHS, but a lot of its bureaucracy is so mind numbingly awful that they lose support from users.

What they have done is invalidate the survey.

Seems like 2024 isn't going to be much better than 2023 for women's sex based rights.

vivariumvivariumsvivaria · 29/12/2023 00:43

Am I missing the link? I need to rage too, this will do nicely.

socialdilemmawhattodo · 29/12/2023 01:27

I spent quite a lot of time completing the survey. It is important. I might be older but my experience of early menopause, the missing of same and the longer term consequences meant I wanted to complete the survey. I also had a lot to say about fertility treatment. Then that final page. I looked up current NHS terminology and the survey terms don't meet that. So I queried the use of trans female etc as I felt people with eal, learning disabilities
Etc would struggle with understanding. I was clear that I felt this terminology would damage the integrity of the survey. It is shocking that a survey supposedly designed to help support women's services.in the NHS would be sabotaged.by.poor language.

Retiredfromthere · 29/12/2023 06:53

Have not done the survey but the question that is being objected to is presumably there so that researchers using this data can filter results so that they can treat responses differently if reported by - for example - a male born respondent (whether or not transwoman). This seems to be a good thing, as without this filtering there would be no way of identifying and comparing results of different respondents (e.g. Finding out what natal women and/or 'ciswomen' are saying). If this is the intent then the wording seems reasonable. If completing the questionnaire for yourself you will know whether you are male, trans, etc. The question wording is more difficult if you are being asked what someone else is, or reading a deescription about who services are for.

This question suggests that the researchers are aware that some respondents may feel that TWAW/TMAM and respond as if biologically woman/man. It is trying to filter results to address this. Could be interesting to compare.

PeanutAndBanana · 29/12/2023 07:07

@Retiredfromthere - I agree it will be for the purposes of survey analysis. However, it's unhelpful as designed.

Trans women have different experiences of healthcare compared to cis women. And trans men also will have different experiences. Arguably all three of these groups' experiences should be captured and explored in a survey about "women's health". I'd say that understanding that and the differences is helpful even though a lot of the questions won't apply to someone without a female reproductive system. I haven't seen the survey but if it is interested in how the medical profession treats people who present as women in healthcare settings other than obs and gynae contexts then it seems a legitimate endeavour.

But the current question structure doesn't allow analysts to differentiate between those three distinct groups as at best it only allows for two categories even if people understand what "trans female" and "trans men" mean. So it's a stupid structure and it's stupid stuff like this that rightly pisses people off and creates resentment.

Better - by far - to ask at the start about sex and then gender separately and then ask questions about things like cervical screening to those who have a cervix (women) and more general questions to anyone who - by virtue of biology and/or gender - is treated as a woman by the medical establishment at any point.

The trans debate is sensitive and fraught enough without people who should know better muddying the waters. Trans women completing this survey is fine - in my view - but let's be very clear that they don't have the same biology as cis women. They know that, and no one is helped by pretending they do.

NoBinturongsHereMate · 29/12/2023 08:46

the question that is being objected to is presumably there so that researchers using this data can filter results

That's the intention, but as @PeanutAndBanana says, it doesn't allow them to.do that. Never mind people with ESL etc, I actually work in medical data and I don't know what they mean by the categories.

People will tick the wrong one. And even if they all ticked the right one it doesn't allow meaningful data segregation and analysis, because it is 1 question about 2 categories.

Retiredfromthere · 29/12/2023 09:13

Agree the choices render the data filtering intent ineffective. I had misread OP's list apologies. (Now full awake)

Original poster
KitchenDancefloor · 29/12/2023 09:34

And trans debate aside, the fact that the first option is male, on a women's health survey is irritating, stupid and pointless.

OP posts:
IwantToRetire · 29/12/2023 18:07

@KitchenDancefloor can you give the link to the survey as the thread about a women's health survey a while ago is a survey that is now closed.

So not sure why there is another one, or did the extend the original one (that didn't want women over 55 to respond!)

It would help in discussing to have the context of the survey.

Thanks

Original poster
KitchenDancefloor · 29/12/2023 19:42

IwantToRetire · 29/12/2023 18:07

@KitchenDancefloor can you give the link to the survey as the thread about a women's health survey a while ago is a survey that is now closed.

So not sure why there is another one, or did the extend the original one (that didn't want women over 55 to respond!)

It would help in discussing to have the context of the survey.

Thanks

It's a local NHS survey but it may be based on a template used elsewhere

www.smartsurvey.co.uk/s/ZSVU81/

OP posts:
Sometimesrational · 29/12/2023 20:35

Is there the opportunity to share opinion or is it simply multiple choice answers?
I absolutely understand your frustration. And trans female should refer to a transman etc but it's anybody's gues what the people completing it or extracting data from mean. What a waste of time!

socialdilemmawhattodo · 29/12/2023 20:59

Sometimesrational · 29/12/2023 20:35

Is there the opportunity to share opinion or is it simply multiple choice answers?
I absolutely understand your frustration. And trans female should refer to a transman etc but it's anybody's gues what the people completing it or extracting data from mean. What a waste of time!

No, plenty of opportunity to comment on their questions. It took me a lot longer than 10 mins. Guess I had plenty to say on womens health issues! I had even more to say when I got to the final diversity page. Trans female - what the bloody hell does that mean. Which Is why i toddled off to the NHS website - no mention on there at all regarding that particular gender. So I have no idea what that means biologically. They havent capped the number of characters in the gender other do comment box. Which was rather fortunate. (For me, not the survey researchers!)

SamW98 · 29/12/2023 21:04

I’ve just received my letter to book my smear test.

It states that screening is offered to all people with a cervix aged 25-64

Now didn’t there used to be a word to describe ‘people with a cervix?’ 🤔

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