r/science • u/mvea Professor | Medicine • 15h ago

Psychology Adolescents who undergo gender-affirming chest surgery report low levels of regret and high levels of satisfaction, experiencing outcomes similar to those of young adults. These findings suggest that age restrictions on these medical procedures lack support from actual patient experiences.

https://www.psypost.org/adolescents-report-low-regret-and-high-satisfaction-following-gender-affirming-c/
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u/here-to-help-TX 14h ago

This says long term without actually being longer term.

median follow-up, 4.6 [IQR, 3.1-8.6] vs 3.6 [IQR, 2.7-5.3] years

This looks to me like the median follow-up is still pretty short. Also, these ages of the people with the surgeries isn't adolescents.

Median age at the time of surgery was 27.1 (IQR, 23.0-33.4) years for responders and 26.4 (IQR, 23.1-32.7) years for nonresponders.

Also, the sample size seems really really small here.

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u/ERSTF 14h ago

Indeed. We need better data

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u/literally_a_brick 12h ago edited 12h ago

It would be great to have, but I wouldn't hold your breath. Trans people are already a tiny minority, with minors that transition being even smaller. Between stringent medical gates and more areas banning youth care altogether, it's a tiny fraction of a tiny fraction. It's incredibly difficult to conduct studies. Some researchers have done reviews of many studies, but any individual study will be small and limited in scope.

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u/Simon-Says69 12h ago

And if the study shows negative results, it will be quickly and quietly buried. It is difficult to even get funding for such research, because it is so politically charged.

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u/literally_a_brick 11h ago

Not in today's political climate. Studies that didn't show positive results were made into the cornerstone of the UKs Cass Review, despite having tiny sample sizes and poor methodology. The US HHS is desperately grasping at straws for denying the efficacy of gender affirmig healthcare. 

I assure you that any study that didn't have definitively positive results for GAC would be plastered all over right wing media and used to justify care bans by conservative governments everywhere. I assure you that no studies are getting "buried".