NHS England: Trans people shouldn’t wait longer than 18 weeks for treatment

[DragonBeer]

NHS England: Trans people shouldn't wait longer than 18 weeks for treatment

By Nick Duffy
February 20th, 2015

http://www.pinknews.co.uk/2015/02/20/nhs-england-trans-people-shouldnt-wait-longer-than-18-weeks-for-treatment/

NHS England has affirmed the rights of trans people to be treated within 18 weeks of referral – despite growing backlogs in the system leaving some waiting years.

Transgender people recently trying to access gender identity services in the UK have reported lengthy waiting times, with one trans woman facing a wait of 21 months for genital surgery alone.

[Jayne]

Right now the timeframe is 18 weeks but the reality is up to 68 weeks for the first appointment. Most of the work in fixing this needs to come from within the NHS but every individual can do something to help.
In the UK we have the right to request transfer to a different clinic,  contact any GIC you can reasonably travel to and ask what their waiting time is, when you find one that can see you in a decent amount of time then ask your gp to refer you.
If the cost of travel puts you off then you may be able to get money refunded.

Charing Cross GIC is swamped, it seems that every gp automatically refers patients there as if they don't know other clinics exist, if we can spread ourselves around other clinics then we can ease the pressure on CHX GIC.

I will repeat that most of the emphasis is on the NHS to solve this issue but we can help ourselves a bit

[gennee]

That's a long time to wait for an appointment. Is there a central database with all the clinics that have services for transgender people? Seems to be a problem on NHS's side.

[Matt A]

18 weeks? Ha! I know men who have been waiting since 2013, the backlog is terrible there.

I truly hope they get this sorted.