Transgender Health and Healthcare

Transgender health and healthcare refer to the diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of health issues for transgender or gender-non-conforming people. Like the general population, transgender people desire access to safe, non-discriminatory, culturally sensitive, and affordable healthcare. However, although their healthcare needs are similar to that of the cisgender population, transgender people have specific physical health and psychological health needs related to their transgender identity – such as support surrounding gender transition. For the past century, Western medicine has treated transgender bodies – using gender-confirming surgery, also known as sex reassignment surgery (SRS) or gender reassignment surgery (GRS), to align trans people's primary and secondary sex characteristics with their gender identity. Transgender patients are medicalized, often diagnosed with gender dysphoria before receiving gender-confirming care such as hormones or SRS. The World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) provides “standards of care,” a set of clinical guidelines to help practitioners treat patients diagnosed with gender dysphoria. Keywords: health; LGBTQ; medical practices; sexual minorities; transgender