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Mainz Puberty blockers, sex-changing hormone therapies or similar operations should only be approved for people under 18 with gender incongruence or gender dysphoria as part of controlled scientific studies, with the involvement of a multidisciplinary team and a clinical ethics committee and after medical and psychiatric diagnostics and treatment of possible psychological disorders have been completed. The German Medical Association called on the federal government to do this last Friday after a lengthy discussion.

The therapy results should be tracked sociologically, medically, child and adolescent psychiatrically, socially and psychologically over a period of at least ten years. The evaluation results should also be included in the revision of the guidelines on gender incongruence and gender dysphoria in children and adolescents: diagnosis and treatment, according to the resolution.

The Medical Association justifies the decision by saying that appropriate treatments would not improve the symptoms and mental health of affected children and adolescents. The current medical evidence makes this clear.

These are irreversible interventions in the human body in primarily physiologically healthy minors who cannot give informed consent for such measures. According to the decision, the interventions also influenced the psyche, particularly in developing minors.

The administration of puberty blockers and the implementation of opposite-sex hormone treatments is a form of experimental medicine on children, which would most likely result in interventions in the child’s body and could result in the loss of reproductive ability as well as the reduction in sexual experience and anorgasmia, it says the decision.

The German Medical Association decided that concern for the well-being of children should be the main focus given the existing evidence for treatment with appropriate therapies.

Change of gender entry only after diagnosis and advice

According to the delegates, people under 18 should not provide or have any information about their gender and marital status provided in the personal register without prior specialist child and adolescent psychiatric diagnosis and advice. The German Medical Association also decided this last Friday. He called on the federal government to make appropriate changes to the Self-Determination Act.

The rztetag criticizes the Self-Determination Act because the legislature does not adequately differentiate between the subjective sense of belonging and the actual physical-biological gender.

In addition, equating gender-related sense of identity with civil status classification in the official birth register should be viewed critically. Intersexuality is also inadequately differentiated from transsexuality in the law.

The applicants point out that personal status law is not the right instrument to guarantee the self-determination of people affected by gender incongruence, to promote their equal treatment and to protect them from discrimination in everyday life. © nfs/aerzteblatt.de