, and private insurers and Medicare and Medicaid are covering more of them, according to a review of the National Inpatient Sample from 2000 to 2014.
“As coverage for these procedures increases, likely so will demand for qualified surgeons to perform them,” said investigators led by Joseph Canner, MHS, of Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore (JAMA Surg. 2018 Feb 28. doi: 10.1001/jamasurg.2017.6231).
The team sought to correct a glaring lack of demographic, hospital, and surgical data on transgender people, a problem due mainly to “the absence of routine, standardized collection and reporting of gender identity in health care settings,” the investigators said.
The Affordable Care Act banned gender identity discrimination, and state and federal governments – as well as private insurers – are expanding coverage of gender affirmation surgery and care. Given the trend, it’s essential that quality improvement agencies begin to “focus on adopting a new set of patient-centered measures to better monitor transgender care and identify opportunities for advancing transition-related services,” the researchers said.