'A cavity is not a vagina': Trans woman refused healthcare in France
Archived version: https://archive.ph/VczFb
Archived version: https://web.archive.org/web/20230915052333/https://www.euronews.com/2023/09/15/a-cavity-is-not-a-vagina-trans-woman-refused-healthcare-in-france
https://www.euronews.com/2023/09/15/a-cavity-is-not-a-vagina-trans-woman-refused-healthcare-in-franceOpen linkView original on lemmy.zip
Talk about the article just wanting to stir shit with the headlines. And so many of you are falling for it.
The comments about only treating "real women" and not men who "shave their beards" and "tell my secretary that they are a woman" are problematic
The patient needs to be educated about their body and the medical community needs to evolve to better serve trans people as well
I don't understand why someone without a vagina would go to a gynecologist.
I'm very trans friendly, and I agree. A gynecologist is there to help you with things related to your vulva, vagina, uterus, ovaries, fallopian tubes.... If you don't have any of those things, there is nothing a gynecologist can do for you.
gynaecology: the area of medicine concerned with disorders and functions of women's reproductive organs
Was she going there just for the experience or something? What was the end goal she was looking for here...
There is actually a chance to develop cancer in that region as a trans person. Also to check up hormon levels etc., there are a lot of valid reasons
This is just rage bait. The title is intentionally misleading.
I have to ask: considering the profound surgical intervention required to aid a person transition, are there any life lasting specialized care needs to assure health? Or after normal surgery recovery that's it?
from what I know of a friend: There's some stretching required of the new vaginal entrance (medically prescribed dildos back in fashion!) and yes, trans women can potentially develop cancer much like their cis counterparts. Generally advised to get it checked every so often to make sure it's all up to snuff.
No. Very much unlike their cis counterparts, a female transperson has no uterus, no fallopian tubes, or any other part commonly found in a vagina. They can develop topical cancers such as skin cancers or subdermal cancers as in literally any tissue anywhere in their bodies, but those are not cancers generally found during a pap-smear (which is the primary domain of a gyno). Any sufficiently skilled GP or dermatologist would be equally or better suited.
You try and get a dermatologist or gp to inspect vaginal tissue, they're gonna refer you to a gyno
And is that care provided by general practice gynecologists or specialized ones?
She had a standard gyno
That is actually very good and interesting to know.
This comment section is a warzone
This is certainly the most transphobic bigots I've seen in a thread on the Fediverse.
Lemmy.zip seems pretty g*mer centric
It's like everyone from aussie.zone is a capital G too.
I don't think all the aussies can be grandfathers.
I see there's a lot of ignorant bigots in this comment section making claims without any actual knowledge on the topic.
From the Canadian Cancer Society: "If, however, you’re a trans woman who has had bottom surgery to create a vagina (vaginoplasty) and possibly a cervix, there’s a very small risk that you can develop cancer in the tissues of your neo-vagina or neo-cervix."
there's a lot of angry little terfs in here. And a disturbing number of people who seem to think the only thing a gyno does is peer up a clacker with a torch.
im locking this as there are multiple reports of transphobia and bigotry. It appears the comments are devolving into personal attacks.
what the fuck
good ol' trans panic defense 🙄
I don't know enough to say if it's valid for a gynecologist to not treat a trans person, but it's definitely not valid to be an absolute cunt about it. If you have a rational reason not to help them, cool, but you can explain that calmly and try to refer them to a place that can.
He did refer them.
He offered to, but the person ran off and raised a stink online instead of following the rational recommendation. Ahhhh, the 2020s. Good ol' keyboard warriors and their cancel culture.
The person ran off and raised a stink online because the doctor was a being a fucking dick. If he just politely refused and referred them to another doctor, there would be no story.
But that's literally what happened. Her response to that was calling the doctor a transphobe and insulting his staff. She was being a dick first.
Did you even bother to read the article?
I did read the article. Calling her a man is being a dick. Asking for services while being trans is not being a dick.
There is no indication in the article that he called her a man before she flew of the handle.
There is never an excuse to be transphobic. The story doesn't get better for him if she was belligerent first. Let's keep in mind how upsetting this situation is for her, and then instead of de-escalating he makes it worse.
I disagree. That's a much better story for him. Not even sure if he's transphobic or just not trained in PC language. If he meant "I only treat biological women", he'd be correct.
And maybe he was also having a bad day, probably because of her. Why is this on him in the first place?
He worked on so many that he eventually became one. That sounds like a One Punch Man villan origin.
So this doctor is a complete douchbag and should not be practicing medicine. But he's also not entirely wrong. Medically speaking what your gender is is irrelevant most of the time. Of course it applies to any procedures you may be undergoing or medications you may be taking to alter your body to match your gender but that's about it. Any competent doctor will of course respect your gender identity because understanding and having a good relationship with the patient is important. But medically speaking they care more about whether you are at risk for prostate cancer or uterine cysts and your biological sex (alongside your medical history) is a much better indicator of that (outside of relatively rare exceptions). If you are a trans woman who has had bottom surgery then not every gyno is going to have the skillset to help you because that just isn't what many of them are trained for. I've definitely had my doctor tell me I need to see someone else for certain issues because they just didn't have the skillset to help. Of course there are far better ways to say that than how this "doctor" chose to do so, but him not providing care that he wasn't trained to provide isn't the issue here. His douchbag attitude and him not providing a referal to a doctor who could help is the issue.
Agreed with everything you said except that, according to the article, he initially did offer a referral to another doctor. It was only after she got angry that the discourse escalated and he said offensive things in response.
Ah. I must have missed that. In that case it's a little more understandable. He just got pissed off and snapped. Even so you need to be a little more thick skinned than that if you want to be a doctor. I don't know all of the details of course but he still shouldn't have sunk to insults.
Why?
I understand doctors are humans too, and presume that is your reason for questioning “Why?”.
But in defense of doctors being more “thick skinned”, I think patients are generally the more vulnerable side as they are usually the ones with issues. If every doctor they come to snaps at them, they start to lose trust in healthcare providers.
It's not wrong what you are saying, but it's unrealistic. Being "thick skinned" is almost always useful and almost never required. There's not enough doctors already, and only so many "thick skinned" people. Becoming a medical doctor already requires a set of skills, that only a subset of humans have; adding being "thick skinned" as a requirement is simply naive.
I think they’re simply both assholes here.
The trans person who flipped out and verbally abused the doctor/receptionist for referring them elsewhere when the doctor is specifically a women’s reproductive health doctor and the trans woman has no female reproductive system is an asshole.
The doctor who responded to this by going online and calling her a “man who shaved his beard” is also an asshole.
They can both be true.
nah, that's a bullshit excuse. I've been furious enough to wreak physical violence, and even in that state I haven't gone to a bigoted well.
Yank the bastards license. He's clearly ignorant of medical facts and violating his oath
The way you put it lays out the problem very well. Gender identity should be concerned with being women or men or the myriad of blends in between. Healthcare is concerned with male or female, and that doesn't change even if surgery may make the situation complicated and need a specialist.
The doctor was clearly a bit of a cunt about it, but having him treat something that he's not trained to do should not be an expectation. I imagine I would be a bit ticked off too if a male expected me to inspect their lady bits. It would be unethical for me to pretend to, to humor them, and it would put me in a very awkward situation to try dance around not hurting feelings or coming off as narrowminded. Gender identity should be left to social dynamics an specialists and left at the door of a doctor's office.
Having said that a better approach from the gynaecologist would have been to tell them he has no training, but offer to look anyway and help them find a doctor in the area that could be more qualified.
Then she should look for someone that specialises in post plastic surgery care.