When outsiders write the medical guidance
Another “guide to transgender healthcare” bites the dust.
The Irish College of General Practitioners (ICGP) has removed a recently published guide to transgender healthcare from its website following questioning of the report by Gript. The report “Guide for Providing Care for Transgender Patients in Primary Care – Quick Reference Guide” had been written in conjunction with the Transgender Equality Network Ireland (TENI).
Why would a professional medical organization write any medical guidance in conjunction with a political network? And that goes double or triple for a political network promoting the claim that people can be born the wrong sex.
Following publication of the document Gript reached out to ICGP’s press office and, when no response was received, directly to Dr Des Crowley, one of the studies authors, and the Quality and Safety in Practice Committee of the ICGP, with questions regarding TENI’s involvement in the publication – Vanessa Lacey, health and education manager at TENI, was one of the authors of the document. We also asked for clarification of the relevant qualifications possessed by the second study author, Dr Des Crowley, given that his area of expertise seems to lie primarily in addiction management.
This is one way they get so immovably entrenched. Somehow convince medical professionals that being born the wrong sex is 1. possible and 2. a medical issue (while not being something that requires cure, oh god no, it requires Support and Accommodation and Respect), and then convince them that they have to summon you to help with medical guidance. Boom, there you go, now being born in the wrong sex is a Scientific Fact, look it says so right here, and anyone who thinks it’s fantasy is an evil criminal who should be hounded into repentance or death, whichever comes first.
The ICGP, winsomely, hasn’t responded to the questions, but it has removed the “guidance.”
Sections of the ICGP document were taken directly from material TENI had previously been involved in the creation of, with some parts being word for word copies of TENI material. Gript asked the ICGP to clarify the level of involvement that they and TENI had had in the production of the document, and to what extent the document was written by TENI.
One section described puberty blockers as “reversible interventions” whilst making no note about the research limitations in this area or the growing concerns regarding this claim. The NHS, for instances, had previously claimed that puberty blockers were fully reversible but has now moved to say that “little is known about the long-term side effects of hormone or puberty blockers in children with gender dysphoria”, that “it is not known what the psychological effects may be”, and that “it’s also not known whether hormone blockers affect the development of the teenage brain or children’s bones.”
FULLY REVERSIBLE. Maybe. We think. Or maybe not.
The document repeatedly directs GPs to consult with TENI resources in order to decide how best to work with transgender patients, despite the fact that TENI is not a medical organisation, but rather an advocacy group.
My point exactly. Why on earth are medical organizations handing over medical work to advocacy groups this way? Especially when what they’re advocating is medically nonsensical, and in practice destructive?
Maybe some day we will get an answer.
I would also be asking for investigations into what, if any, links the advocacy groups and specialist clinics for treating children with potential gender issues might have with the pharmaceutical companies producing puberty blockers and sex-change hormones.
If that sounds a touch on the conspiracy theory side, in my defence I recently re-read Dr. Ben Goldacre’s excellent Bad Medicine, with its revelation that many patients’ advocacy groups receive a good deal of their funding – often 50% or more of their annual income – from pharmaceutical companies, and are advised on strategies for campaigning, lobbying governments and healthcare providers, and on PR by representitives of pharmaceutical companies. This is particularly prevalent when there is a new drug released or, more pertinent here, where a new use for an existing drug has been identified and deemed potentially profitable.
I’ve just got into bed and there on the shelf is the Goldacre book I’ve just re-read, which is of course Bad Pharma, not Bad Medicine.
Bad brain!
There’s some kind of misunderstanding/scope creep here–there is a role for advocacy groups in medical treatment, which is making medical staff aware of issues relating to marginalised populations that might prevent or hinder some people in those populations from getting the treatment they need. (This role is obviously not advising on diagnosis or treatment.) I know about it because I did a brief mental healthcare training which discussed this, and am by no means an expert, or a medical professional–maybe another reader who is one of those things can explain better.