New Study Finds ‘Methodological Flaws’ And ‘Significant Risk Of Harm’ In ‘Dutch Protocol’ For Pediatric Medical Transition

A new study revealed that even the “best” Evidence for pediatric medical transition is not of high quality and should not serve as justification to medically transitioning minors.

A Peer-reviewed paper Published last week Critically Analyzed “gold standard” The evidence supports medically trans-identified kids being medically transitioned, also known as the “Dutch studies,” And it was. “profound, previously unrecognized problems,” What is required? “urgent attention from the medical community,” According to The Society for Evidence-based Gender Medicine is an international organization of more than 100 clinicians and researchers.

“These problems range from erroneously concluding that gender dysphoria disappeared as a result of ‘gender-affirmative treatment,’ to reporting only the best-case scenario outcomes and failing to properly examine the risks, despite the fact that a significant proportion of the treated sample experienced adverse effects,” SEGM. (emphasis theirs).

The paper was titled “The Myth of Reliable Research in Pediatric Gender Medicine,” This article focuses on the two. Dutch studies The resulting “Dutch protocol” This inspired the “gender-affirming” The Dutch model of care is now widely used. The Dutch protocol was frequently considered to be the more conservative and cautious approach to radicalization. “affirming” However, there is no reason to even select minor candidates for medically transition.

According to the authors of the paper, the Dutch protocol — which used hormones and surgeries to give minors the appearance of secondary sex characteristics of the opposite sex — would never have been accepted by today’s standards of evidence-based medicine because of its extremely low-quality research and harm caused to some of its participants.

Before medicine was established, the three Amsterdam-based clinicians who medically treated gender dysphoric adolescents were practicing in the 1980s/90s. “evidence-based” Practice and heavily relied upon “expert opinion.”

This protocol is the reason it became the foundation. “gender-affirming care,” According to the authors, this is done through a phenomenon known as “runaway diffusion,” The medical community mistakenly considers a small experiment to be a proven practice. The harm done by “runaway diffusion” Systematic reviews of the evidence can be used to mitigate this problem and then implement it. “practice reversal,” As Finland, Sweden, EnglandRecent developments include the recent state of Florida The authors acknowledge that they did.

The paper’s authors charge that the Dutch studies were biased in cherry-picking participants with positive or neutral outcomes and excluding participants with negative outcomes to make it appear as though there was an overall positive outcome. The Dutch studies were originally intended to determine whether the treatment was effective. “improved psychological functioning,” But their research was not able to prove benefits. The goalposts were moved to a measure. “satisfaction with treatment.”

“The Dutch studies reported only the best-case scenario outcomes while ignoring the serious risks that emerged; wrongly concluded that gender dysphoria ‘disappeared’ post-treatment; and failed to separate the effects of psychotherapy from those of blockers, hormones and surgery,” SEGM Summary In a tweet

The authors discuss the numerous short-term studies published since the Dutch research. “perfected the art of spin — misrepresenting weak, uncertain, or even negative findings as strong and positive,” SEGM. SEGM also noted the lack of professionalism in political activism by gender-clinicians. Many of them try to silence scientific debate by calling it “fake news”. “science denialism” Motivated by “transphobia.”

“The key problem in pediatric gender medicine is not the lack of research rigor in the past—it is the field’s present-day denial of the profound problems in the existing research, and an unwillingness to engage in high quality research requisite in evidence-based medicine,” According to the paper’s authors.

Leor Sapir is a Manhattan Institute Fellow who shared this article. Summary Twitter followers, explaining the significance of the paper. The Dutch studies are frequently cited as the “The”. “best available evidence” In Guidelines For the treatment of gender dysphoric teenagers by the World Professional Association for Transgender Health(WPATH), Endocrine Society and American Academy of Pediatrics.

“The new article is therefore hugely significant, as it goes to the heart of the entire pediatric medical transition enterprise,” Sapir. “It explains in detail why the Dutch studies are fatally flawed and anyway inapplicable to the current clinical scene.”