Another legal case - Family sues NHS for prescribing child cross sex hormones

[TheRozzers]

Looks like an important case.

PSHE Brighton nails the issue in this quote:

“A <a class="break-all" href="https://archive.ph/o/ioSTS/www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/05/01/autistic-trans-teenager-must-not-be-prescribed-hormones/" rel="nofollow" target="blank">pipeline of vulnerable, traumatised, often autisticc and same-sex attracted children in Brighton and Hove being fast tracked for irreversible sex-change treatment”.

archive.ph/2024.12.22-072840/www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/12/22/nhs-faces-high-court-legal-fight-over-cross-sex-hormones/

I truly question their fitness to practice medicine in general. How can people so distanced from reality (biology/medicine/etc) accurately diagnose and treat patients? They can’t.

I can beleve that Sam is otherwise a good doctor. It's one of the oddities of this situation and it can go along with autism as well. Someone can be a good doctor in every other way but if you hit this individual's idee fixe (or obsession) then rationality, professional objectivity and all the rest goes out of the window.

This case?

https://www.transgendertrend.com/child-q-win-mother-court-appeal/

This is from the successful appeal in December. I'm not aware of any more recent news relating to it from last week though.

(Funnily enough I've been thinking a fair bit about this case recently - specifically in relation to Sarah Phillimore's recent posts on X about the Kevin Lister hearings that will happen shortly. That's a derail from this thread though so I'll not comment on that here.)

Think I beg to differ. I'm sure Harold Shipman had some patients who reckoned he was a good GP. Turns out he was a murderous monster.
I see medics who promote their own niche ideologies in the same way - they are personally causing immense harm to children / young people who are in no position to defend themselves against powerful individuals on a mission to promote their own addled beliefs - whether they be doctors, educators, therapists and the rest.
They're dangerous individuals, harming young people in plain sight and we're all standing by just watching.

I know; mine prefers it because he hates things to change. But I'm surprised to hear it used by a current GP.

According to their website out of a patient population of 25,000 they have 2,000 who are "trans" or non-binary.

I am surprised that the local integrated care board is prepared to pay for the out of area "trans" patients but this is Brighton so presumably the ICB is captured too.

Apols for the derail though! I had a more connected thought going on there but the cat fell off the windowsill onto the dog.

Sam claims to have gone through a 'second puberty' of the opposite sex, which is obviously not possible, and seems surprised that taking testosterone has affected Sam's brain.

I can't see how anyone can be a good doctor who doesn't understand that puberty is the process of reaching sexual maturity and that hormones have an effect on the brain.

Fair comments @OldCrone and @MrsOvertonsWindow

What I meant is that I wouldn't be surprised if Dr Sam is capable of understanding the mental effects of oestrogen when prescribing the pill to a teenager, and maybe also the mental effects of testosterone on a girl who is taking them illegally for sports. But two and two don't add up to four. They're like separate mental compartments.

It's a tricky one isn't it? I've lived trying to be compassionate for people with issues, have worked with any number of children and adults with challenges. But it seems that society has given a free pass to people who are almost completely destructive. Who are not only self absorbed in their niche ideology but are determined to change society in the most dangerous and anti social ways possible, to suit themselves with not a care for the rights of others. And because so many have bought into "the most vulnerable group ever" we've stood by and watched children / young people be mutilated, sterilised and harmed, women be relegated to support humans for toxic men and all the rest

None of what's happened is OK and it's offensive and dangerous that certain doctors are allowed to twist medical ethics and practice to suit their own demands.
I'm well out of sympathy for them, no matter what their personal issues are. We really need to be prosecuting them for abusing their positions.

It is wider than that I think; there is a belief that minorities should always have the same as the majority and the majority must lose out in order to make it so. A minority is automatically considered oppressed and entitled to these changes plus ‘compensation’ for being a minority so equality is no longer enough.

This belief seems to hold regardless of what the minority and the majority represent.

The BLM movement was a catalyst for major organisations (NHS Trusts, schools, charities) in accepting critical theory (CT) as a set of facts, rather than theory. Lots of NHS trusts, charities and organisations now adopt CT as a set of facts upon which policy must be based. It’s not hard to spot once you are familiar with CT. A example being using the term ‘minoratised group’ (a group who are deliberately oppressed) over ‘minority group’ (which leaves room for a range of meanings).

CT views everything through the lens of power and oppression and suggests that those who hold most power are intent on oppressing others to maintain their power and privilege. It’s structured so that attempts to refute the theory are positioned as evidence of its validity. Anyone claiming the theory is wrong or limited is positioned as seeking to maintain their privilege (consciously or unconsciously) or as having false consciousness (having been conditioned by the oppressors to accept the status quo).

My professional training involved extensive teaching and learning about critical thinking and applying it to all theory and research (we are required to be evidence based practitioners and only use evidence that is high quality). Yet today, most of the training providers apply a CT lens to everything, and dismiss challenge to critical theory using the arguments above. They talk about ‘decolonising’ research and how western ideas about research (the scientific method) has been a ‘tool of oppression).

The term ‘queering’ is used as accessible CT terminology to reflect the rejection of dominant structures and systems that serve to oppress.

I know that lots of posters are regularly surprised/dismayed by clear and factual arguments not leading to opposing arguments being dropped. If/when people accept CT as the truth, they will see any fact that challenges a ‘minoratised group’ as a tool of oppression and therefore something to be dismissed.

They talk about ‘decolonising’ research

In reality it any “decolonisation” is actually colonisation by a powerful lobby.

Decolonised research seems to amount to lots of Judith Butleresque ramblings along the lines of ‘there are different ways or knowing and being and all are equally valid’ - excluding material reality!

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/ce397vzkyvdo

NHS Sussex said on Thursday it had launched "a rapid investigation into this activity".

So many potential medical negligence claims could be helping speed the NHS response.

More on the investigation:

https://www.sussex.ics.nhs.uk/children-and-young-people-under-18-years-of-age-who-were-offered-gender-care-at-the-wellbn-general-practice-brighton/

The estimate is that between 70 - 139 children and young people (under 18) were being prescribed hormones and/or PBs by WellBN in May 2025.

https://www.sussex.ics.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/sites/9/2025/07/Patient-Safety-Investigation-Terms-of-Reference-ToR.pdf

Thanks Justme. This really is a cash cow for those with no professional ethics.

Gotta say, based on the pic in the Telegraph, Sam does make quite a convincing bloke. Obviously don't know what Sam's like in person.

I would be interested on the legal position for these doctors bearing in mind the other thread about the doctor charged with encouraging GBH re another man with a sexual fetish for removing ‘body parts’ from people.

Giving a child off label drugs for no good reason other than the fact they requested them has to be sounding pretty unlawful?

I wonder if there is anything solid these doctors can realistically point to defend themselves legally (guidance, protocols etc) or whether it’s all a bit flimsy…

A doctor from this practise has resigned. Dr Sam Hall is a transman.

https://www.scenemag.co.uk/dr-sam-hall-resigns-from-wellbn-amidst-nhs-scrutiny-a-loss-for-trans-healthcare-in-brighton/

Oh, and I see I'm well late the thread.

As you were!

There are data boxes there that have been redacted. The fact that they have been redacted suggest the numbers are not zero (other data fields have 'zero' as a value and have not been redacted).

These would appear to include patients under 13 who appear to have been prescribed puberty blockers, testosterone, and oestrogen, on my reading. Is this correct? (point 1.7 in the terms of reference).

'All those where hormones were initiated before the age of 16 years will be
offered a local clinical endocrinology assessment, and the specialist
endocrinology team will provide expert support to discuss individual case
management. The endocrinology service will identify the potential harms that
will need to be considered, the investigations that might be required (e.g.
DEXA scan), and the guidance for local management of endocrinology
prescription withdrawal.'
...
'A decision by a practitioner to initiate / assume responsibility for prescribing of GnRHa or masculinising / feminising hormones in the absence of an extended multi-disciplinary assessment has many risks.'
...
'The Cass Report describes that the absence of an extended assessment and / or absence of ongoing therapeutic relationship with a specialist clinical team risks a premature and inexorable commitment to a medical pathway, with potentially irreversible physical and psychological effects (including impaired physical growth, sexual functioning and cognitive development), and loss of body autonomy in later life. The absence of advice or support from a specialist consultant-led paediatric endocrinology team increases the risk of physical harms, including where prescribing is contraindicated because of the individual’s
specific circumstances; incorrect dosage resulting in irreversible physical harms (such as accelerated skeletal development); and where there are inadequate arrangements in place for physical investigations and monitoring (baseline and follow-up).
...
The absence of an extended assessment and diagnostic process, and access to specialist medical advice, increases the risk that a child or young person is not sufficiently informed of, or understanding of, the potential risks, benefits, harms and outcomes of GnRHa or exogenous hormones (and of the limited evidence base) for the purpose of giving informed consent to the administration and prescribing of the intervention; and there may be increased risk of lack of capacity to consent.

In view of the risk of infertility, harm may be caused if the young person is not referred to a specialist fertility and reproductive practitioner including for the purpose of advice on gamete preservation options.'

What have they done.

Data tables that seem to me to suggest some of these children were under 13.

😢😢😢😢

This just makes me so sad.

Also, so incredibly angry about what is yet to unfold. This bit ⬇️ makes me think of the forthcoming puberty blocker trial, which appears to be open to an unlimited number of people when it starts:

The absence of advice or support from a specialist consultant-led paediatric endocrinology team increases the risk of physical harms, including where prescribing is contraindicated because of the individual’s
specific circumstances; incorrect dosage resulting in irreversible physical harms (such as accelerated skeletal development); and where there are inadequate arrangements in place for physical investigations and monitoring (baseline and follow-up).

It is clear that every child who takes PBs until their natural window of development has closed and/or cross-sex hormones will have permanent, irreversible harm done to their body. How could any child make a decision to do this to themselves with any meaningful informed consent? I'm in two minds on the parents who back their children doing this - some genuinely do believe that their child will die if they don't get this treatment (because they've been convinced of this by medical professionals who they trust).... whereas some have other issues going on (e.g. narcissist parents with YouTube channels who want fame and money through their child's "identity", Munchausen by Proxy, homophobic parents "transing away the gay).

And obviously the harm continues after 18. Yes, it will be reduced if someone doesn't start these "treatments" until later, but there will still be harm done. Most likely, the reduction in harm will be in cognitive development and sexual function, because their brains and bodies will have been given chance to develop up to the point when they start the medication.