American Academy of Plastic Surgeons
Some The organization, some of whose members are currently being sued by transgender people, is reportedly distancing itself from the practice of performing sex-reassignment surgery on children, raising questions about the value and effectiveness of such procedures.
The organization, which represents about 11,000 members in the U.S. and Canada, recently
said Manhattan Institute researcher Leor Sapir said he “does not endorse any organization’s practice recommendations regarding the treatment of adolescents with gender dysphoria,” apparently referring to those put forward by the radical and scandal-plagued World Professional Association for Transgender Health.
ASPS is
Recognized “There is considerable uncertainty about the long-term effectiveness of thoracic and genital surgical interventions,” it said, adding that “the existing evidence base is regarded as being of low quality and low certainty.”
Sapir pointed out:
In evidence-based medicine, “low quality” evidence has a very specific meaning: the true effect of an intervention is likely to be significantly different from the results reported in the study. As one expert in evidence-based medicine put it, low quality “not only means that there’s uncertainty about the study design, but also that the long-term benefits outweigh the harms.”
The feedback from ASPS mirrors some of the conclusions reached in the landmark Cass Review, which effectively put the final nail in the coffin for “gender-affirming care” arguments earlier this year.
Dr Hilary Cass, a British physician and former president of the Royal College of Paediatrics, was appointed by England’s National Health Service in 2020 to lead an independent review into the UK’s gender reassignment system and young people’s services.
Blaze News previously reported that Cass The 388-page final reportThe report, released in April, found that:
- “The systematic review showed no clear evidence that social transitions in early childhood have any positive or negative mental health outcomes, and the evidence that they have any effects in adolescence is relatively weak.”
- Puberty blockers reduce bone mineral density and have no apparent effect on “gender dysphoria or body satisfaction.”
- “Evidence is insufficient and/or inconsistent regarding the effects of puberty suppression on gender dysphoria, mental and psychosocial health, cognitive development, cardiometabolic risk, and fertility.”
- “There is a lack of high-quality studies evaluating the effects of masculinizing or feminizing hormones in adolescents with gender dysphoria or gender nonconformity, and few studies have long-term follow-up.”
- So-called gender-affirming care is an “area where the evidence is significantly weak.”
The report had a significant impact in Britain but, at least among the major medical societies, had much less of an impact on this side of the Atlantic.
“I think that’s where the public is being misled.”
The American Academy of Pediatrics, for example, still includes WPATH recommendations in its guidelines, and last summer the organization, which represents about 67,000 pediatricians, reaffirmed its support for pediatric gender reassignment.
Cass
said The New York Times reported in May that the AAP is “sticking to a position that multiple systematic reviews have demonstrated to be outdated.”
“If people were to say, ‘This is clinical consensus, we’re not sure’ it wouldn’t be so much of an issue. But some organisations are stressing that the evidence is good. And I think that’s misleading the public. We need to be honest about the strength of the evidence and say what we’re going to do to improve it,” Cass said.
Sapir learned of ASPS’s uncertainty last month after contacting the World Professional Association for Transgender Health for comment about leaked internal documents from the organization.
Environmental Progress The nationally syndicated radio host and co-founder of Blaze Media discussed it at length. Glenn Beck.
The report by Environmental Progress Research Fellow Mia Hughes quoted members of WPATH and discussed the use of irreversible medical procedures on mentally unstable patients who are unable to consent, the inability of parents and young people to understand the long-term effects of so-called gender reassignment surgery, the obscuring of post-surgery regret, and the impact of sex-reassignment surgery.
ASPS told Sapir it is aware that WPATH suppressed systematic reviews of evidence in the process of developing so-called standards of care.
The Blaze News previously reported that the Biden-Harris administration’s gender-bending assistant secretary of Health and Human Services successfully pressured WPATH to remove the minimum age requirement from its Standards of Care document.
ASPS said it is currently “reviewing and prioritizing several initiatives that best support evidence-based gender surgical care to provide guidance to plastic surgeons.”
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