Transgender Medicine and Research

Collection of Resources from both sides of the TG debate.

InfoHealer

Jan 24

Transgender Medicine and Research

Collection of Resources from both sides of the TG debate.

To read the full Disclaimer: Click here | Last Updated: 03/01/23

Introduction

The study published in June 2022 by the renown non-partisan, non-advocacy, polling and social science research firm Pew Research Center has revealed that American Public holds increasingly complex and polarized views related to the issues of gender identity and transgenderism (Ref), (Ref).

The polarization of public opinion about those matters is reflected by the fact that Americans are almost perfectly divided in half over the extent to which our society has accepted transgender people. Namely:

38% of polled Americans say society has gone TOO far in accepting transgender individuals,
36% of them say society has NOT gone far enough in acceptance of transgender people,
the remainder believes that things are as they should be in this regard.

The vast majority of Public (about 80%) acknowledges the existence of discrimination against transpeople and acknowledges their limited acceptance by a society (Ref). The polarizing almost equal division of the Society regarding this topic is highlighted further by the fact that even among those who acknowledge existence of at least some discrimination against transpeople:

54% still claims that society has either been about right or even gone too far in terms of trans acceptance, while
46% believes that public has NOT gone far enough (Ref).

According to PRC group the polarizing views on transgenderism correlate well with the partisanship and professed political ideology (Ref). Specifically:

Democrats are much more likely than Republicans to say our society has NOT gone far enough in accepting transpeople (59% vs. 10%).
Republicans are less than four times as likely as Democrats to say that a person’s gender can be different from the sex they were assigned at birth (13% vs. 61%).

Interestingly however, when asked about the major factors which influence their opinion on transgender matters - many Americans do not invoke ideology or religion. Instead they point out to SCIENCE as the most important for them reason (Ref).

In the view of this self-proclaimed reliance of American Public on the SCIENCE it appears to be useful to compile the collection of the clinical guidelines and position statements related to Transgender Medicine and Research which are science based according to their authors and prepared by the variety of the medical and professional societies.

As we discussed previously in “Politicization, Polarization & Power Asymmetry: The Sinister Triad Affecting Modern Medicine” members of the general public and professionals who belong to the two competing political factions - tend to dwell inside their own insulated Echo Chambers and Filter Bubbles (Ref), (Ref). In result they rarely read directly the texts produced by the opposing ideological camp. To close that gap we have decided to collect the representative texts produced by the professional organizations from both sides of the ongoing debate over the Transgender Medicine.

This is a collection of links to clinical guidelines, standards of care, position statements and similar guiding texts regarding Transgender Medicine and Research.

While we do make an effort to update those links, please note that newer versions of some of those texts may be already available from the issuing them organizations. Some of those organizations may require users to enable cookies in their browsers and/or log in to access their guidelines.

The recommendations and opinions contained in those linked below texts are the sole responsibility of the issuing them organizations. Posting links and informations about those those guidelines does not constitute their endorsement by “Information Heals”.

TG AFFIRMING POINT OF VIEW:

WPATH: World Professional Association for Transgender Health

WPATH is one of the oldest international entities dealing with the issues of gender dysphoria and matters covered by the overarching term: Transgender Medicine. It was originally named the Harry Benjamin International Gender Dysphoria Association (HBIGDA), after Harry Benjamin, MD (1885-1986). HBIGDA was officially incorporated in September 1979 and changed its name to WPATH in 2007. WPATH issues periodically updated standards of care (SOC). The history and and purpose of WPATH SOC can be found here.

Click on the underlined title below to access the recent WPATH SOC:

WPAH: Standards of Care for the Health of Transgender and Gender Diverse People, Version 8 (2022)

TES: The Endocrine Society

The Endocrine Society was founded in 1916 (Ref) as The Association for the Study of Internal Secretions. TES is the mainstream professional, international medical organization in the field of endocrinology and metabolism. ItThe official name of the organization was changed to the Endocrine Society in 1952. It is considered one of the leading scientific organization in the field of endocrinology which is understandable in the view of its history. Due to its focus on science it used to be most popular among the academic scientists which resulted in creation of the AACE (see below) in 1991, an organization that is more focused on clinical aspects of endocrinology.

Click on the underlined title below to access the full text recent TES guidelines:

Endocrine Treatment of Gender Incongruent/Gender Dysphoric Persons: An Endocrine Society Clinical Practice Guideline (2017)

Click on the underlined title below to access the TES Guideline Resources:

TES: Gender Dysphoria/Gender Incongruence Guideline Resources (2022)

AACE: The American Association of Clinical Endocrinology

AACE: The American Association of Clinical Endocrinology was founded in the year 1991 as the American Association of Clinical Endocrinologists (AACE) with the stated purpose to serve as the active voice for clinical endocrinologists (Ref). As founder of AACE explains at their WebPage (Ref), at the time, clinical endocrinology had no input to the Health Care Financing Administration (HCFA), nor were clinical endocrinologists represented in the health policy-making bodies of most influential physician societies (i.e., American Medical Association and the American College of Physicians - American Society of Internal Medicine). The AACE was created to address this need.

Click on the underlined title below to access the AACE Position Statement:

AACE Position Statement: Transgender and Gender Diverse Patients and the Endocrine Community

Click on the underlined title below to access the full text of the AACE guidelines:

American Association of Clinical Endocrinologists/Endocrine Society Update on Transgender Medicine: Case Discussions (2017)