Science AMA Series: I'm Cecilia Dhejne a fellow of the European Committee of Sexual Medicine, from the Karolinska University Hospital in Sweden. I'm here to talk about transgender health, suicide rates, and my often misinterpreted study. Ask me anything!

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Hi reddit!

I am a MD, board certified psychiatrist, fellow of the European Committee of Sexual medicine and clinical sexologist (NACS), and a member of the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH). I founded the Stockholm Gender Team and have worked with transgender health for nearly 30 years. As a medical adviser to the Swedish National Board of Health and Welfare, I specifically focused on improving transgender health and legal rights for transgender people. In 2016, the transgender organisation, ‘Free Personality Expression Sweden’ honoured me with their yearly Trans Hero award for improving transgender health care in Sweden.

In March 2017, I presented my thesis “On Gender Dysphoria” at the Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden. I have published peer reviewed articles on psychiatric health, epidemiology, the background to gender dysphoria, and transgender men’s experience of fertility preservation. My upcoming project aims to describe the outcome of our treatment program for people with a non-binary gender identity.

Researchers are happy when their findings are recognized and have an impact. However, once your study is published, you lose control of how the results are used. The paper by me and co-workers named “Long-term follow-up of transsexual persons undergoing sex reassignment surgery: cohort study in Sweden.“ have had an impact both in the scientific world and outside this community. The findings have been used to argue that gender-affirming treatment should be stopped since it could be dangerous (Levine, 2016). However, the results have also been used to show the vulnerability of transgender people and that better transgender health care is needed (Arcelus & Bouman, 2015; Zeluf et al., 2016). Despite the paper clearly stating that the study was not designed to evaluate whether or not gender-affirming is beneficial, it has been interpreted as such. I was very happy to be interviewed by Cristan Williams Transadvocate, giving me the opportunity to clarify some of the misinterpretations of the findings.

I'll be back around 1 pm EST to answer your questions, AMA!

">Science AMA Series: I'm Cecilia Dhejne a fellow of the European Committee of Sexual Medicine, from the Karolinska University Hospital in Sweden. I'm here to talk about transgender health, suicide rates, and my often misinterpreted study. Ask me anything!