Trans Health: Prioritizing The Cookie Cutter Patient and Denying Everyone Else

• In Event: Transgender and Queer Embodiments

Abstract

Over the past decade, there has been a major increase in the number of healthcare professionals that focus on trans adolescent medicine. However, only the needs of certain patient populations are being met. How might the impact of the healthcare services offered, or more specifically withheld, from populations of color and lower socioeconomic statuses affect the embodiment of trans adolescents and how does this intersection of identities and healthcare at this time shape the future of gender/sex? By assessing which populations of adolescents are receiving medical technologies in order to medically transition (e.g puberty blockers, gender affirming hormones, etc), we can theorize what the future of gender/sex may look like for trans communities. Building on past scholarship, this chapter is devoted to exploring how the intersections of race, socioeconomic status, and gender expression impact healthcare access for trans adolescent patients. Utilizing one-on-one interviews with healthcare professionals (28) and transgender adolescents (23), I argue that these barriers to medical care will (1) further establish a racialized, classed, and transnormative hierarchy within the trans community, and (2) shape the gender/sex of trans people due to the sociocultural assumptions made by healthcare providers, and the historical context to which we are currently situated in.

Author

• Lindsay Toman, Colgate University