Being Transgender Is No Longer a Disorder

[SandraJane]

Slate


Being Transgender Is No Longer a Disorder

The American Psychiatric Association salutes the T in LGBT.

By J. Bryan Lowder|Posted Monday, Dec. 3, 2012, at 6:21 PM ET


http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/medical_examiner/2012/12/dsm_revision_and_sexual_identity_gender_identity_disorder_replaced_by_gender.html


The Associated Press reported that the American Psychiatric Association's Board of Trustees approved certain notable changes to that body's Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders on Saturday. The story began with the controversial announcement that Asperger's syndrome will now be included in the autism spectrum disorder category, but another change buried at the bottom of the piece may prove to be even more divisive—and, if historical precedent is any indication, more influential on society at large.

Since the third edition of the DSM was published in 1980, some version of the diagnosis gender identity disorder has been included to describe patients whose subjective experience of gender does not match their biological sex. The common contemporary term for this group is transgender, the T in LGBT. Sources within the APA now confirm that in the DSM-5, which is due to be published in May 2013, GID will be replaced with the more neutral term gender dysphoria.