Medical Provider support in your journey - a survey

[AnonyMs]

Compassionate and trust worthy care are reasonable to want as is your desire for privacy.  I cannot stick up for your doctors trustworthiness but it is important to have an accurate history about you to help avoid mistakes, complications or dosage calculation problems.  Nobody wants you to die, we get there soon enough naturally.   If someone acknowledges doing illegal drugs it is a doctors imperative responsibility to offer support and the help one may need.  I don't know what drugs are legal down under in OZ but laws are changing here in the US.  Pot will be legal in Oregon next July, for example.  Sorry about the mini derail

I think this is on topic, as these decisions do affect health care. Mine at least.

I agree about having the history which is why I told them even though I didn't think it relevant. I'm not a doctor so I didn't want to risk it. The small chance that the information would be important against the small risk of it being more widely disclosed. Rightly or wrongly I believe being outed would have serious consequences, and they are in complete ignorance of what it could cost me. It's my choice and my responsibility and they stole it from me. And if there's ever a next time they have increased the risk of me making the wrong decision.

To look at it another way, I gave my consent to a certain course of treatment, but they lied to me about what it was. I got something I didn't didn't consent to.

Perhaps this kind of thing would help other people, but I'm not other people and this is not the kind of society I like living in.

My experience is that OD's get treated and released.. Unless it's an obvious suicide attempt - then the psych department gets called for a consult..

And as to writing it in you patient records, perhaps you should check what's legally required to be recorded..

What if OD's got treated and then sent to jail? That's kind of how I feel. You could make an argument that its only right to do that, and I'm sure many would. It would probably even save some lives, at the cost of others. I don't agree with it though.

I see your point about the records, but it doesn't really matter if its legally required or not. Either way I don't agree with it, its just a question of where the blame lies. And if they had told me they were going to write it down perhaps I would still have told them, but it becomes my choice again.

I may be out there by myself on this, but I don't trust other people with my life if I can help it. There's no choice sometimes, and I won't be doing SRS on myself anytime soon, but I'm careful to keep records and double check whatever I can. I've seen quite a few mistakes and I don't hold the medical profession as a whole in very high regard. I tend to think of them more like highly educated plumbers.

I'm being taken care of by a team of doctors in a hospital network that brought me back from the gates of hell and are probably the most professional in the universe.

I don't want to seem like I'm down on all of them as its not true. My endo and psych have probably saved my life. But the good people don't somehow make the bad ones acceptable.

I see parallels with informed consent for HRT, and SRS for that matter. Who gets to make the decisions about your life?

[Anna R]

Seems that Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide are fairly well catered for, don't know about the other state/territory capitals in Oz or the regional/rural areas.

For what it's worth, Hobart has a gender /sexual dept of Royal Hobart Hospital and so far am getting really positive reactions from them.

An addition I feel is relative,
My G.P. is lovely but will have to have a word or two if she persists in addressing me as "Sir" , other than this had no trouble telling her in detail everything about myself and even  after she told me that Tasmania has no-one who can help me ,when I finally accessed info to the contrary she was happy to write a referral .
The general practitioners down here really are not aware of the excellent services available.

[Eveline]

I'm getting a report together on what support you were able to get from therapists, endocrinologists, family doctors, surgeons etc during your transition.
...

Cindy, I'm in the U.S.

Therapists
I had an early experience with "therapy" from someone who presented themselves as qualified, but turned out to be sketchy. After about 3 months I decided I was OK without therapy anyway, and haven't felt the need since. I do plan to see a therapist to get my SRS letter, but that's it.

Endocrinologists
I started off with by seeing an endo who did implants, but after a few very expensive months, I decided to ask my doctor to manage the HRT. She prescribed estradiol and progesterone in pill form, dissolved sublingually, which ended up being much cheaper and seemingly just as effective. I don't feel the need to go back to an endo at this time.

Family Doctors
I've worked only with Family Practice doctors who specialize in transgender issues. Not hard to find where I started (California) and surprisingly easy to find where I am now (South Florida). Both have been women, and both very attentive and supportive.

Also in both cases, the doctor's office has also been able to draw blood. That has been convenient - and saved me from potential embarrassment later in the transition, when I presented as female but still had male ID. I have found the reception staff at the local blood-draw labs to be kind of clueless.

Surgeons
So far, I've had FFS and BA.

For FFS, I read the boards here extensively, and decided on a well-known FFS surgeon in South America. A major factor was saving money.

He performed several procedures for me. Some went very well, but others required corrective work a few months later. I didn't feel comfortable going back to that surgeon, so I had the corrective work done here in South Florida, by a regular plastic surgeon.

I don't know if things would have gone better if I'd chosen a more expensive FFS surgeon to start with - maybe you do get what you pay for. In the end, I probably ended up paying even more due to the corrections.

For BA, I used the same South Florida plastic surgeon. He specializes in sub-fascial implants, and I've been very happy with the results and follow-up.

Hope this is helpful!

[AndrewG]

I'm in the UK

Still at the very start of my transition, but my experience so far hasn't been all that fantastic. The first time I went to my doctor he asked me to go away and think about it, because "being a man might just seem easier at times". Think about it! I'd done nothing but think about it for a couple of months before booking the appointment. It was obvious that arguing with him wasn't going to help, so I finally built up the courage to go back and tell a different doctor. She's referred me to where I need to go now, without any fuss.

Think my main complaint is the length of waiting lists. When I first saw a GP for depression in July last year I was told to try and online course. It might have helped me a bit writing down what my "issues" were, but because it only ever reads back exactly what you put in and try to teach you techniques, it's impossible for it to pick up what you're not saying. When I went back I was referred to a talk therapy service, but the waiting list was six months! This wasn't even an NHS based one, but an organisation they partner with because the real waiting lists are so long. I knew I couldn't wait that long so finally, around November, I found myself a therapist privately. He's been brilliant. I mentioned my gender issues to him right away and that's given me a lot of confidence to explore. It really annoys me that I could have had a similar experience months before.

My understanding now is that I'm currently on a waiting list to see the local psychiatry team (around 4 months) who then refer me to the GIC (currently 15 months) So another year and a half then!