The Ministry of Health says work is underway to explore sending people overseas for gender reassignment surgery. Currently surgeries are on hold in New Zealand due to the retirement of the only surgeon able to carry them out. There are 61 people waiting for funded gender reassignment surgery – four are supposed to happen every two years: three MtF surgeries in New Zealand and one FtM surgery overseas. Senior Advisor for the Ministry’s High Cost Treatment Pool Ailsa Jacobson told Parliament’s Health Select Committee this morning sending more people overseas for surgery is being explored, with the help of referring physicians. “It’s no more expensive to send a patient overseas for the surgery than it has been to provide it in New Zealand to date.” Transgender advocacy groups such as Agender have been suggesting such a move for some time, saying Thailand in particular has a number of highly skilled and up-to-date surgeons and first rate staff. Specialists within DHBs, who work directly with patients, are working to find suitable providers overseas. Jacobson says they won’t just send people to an overseas provider who hasn’t been thoroughly assessed. She says the referring specialist has to do their own background work in this area. Jacobson says the Ministry does have a list of overseas providers, but work continues to ensure they meet the necessary standards. There are four people whose surgeries are now well overdue due to the retirement of the only surgeon doing the work in New Zealand. Jacobson says it’s hoped their surgeries will happen within this year. Labour MP Louisa Wall called for the Ministry to also look ahead to the future. She said auditing the 61 people waiting on the list would be a start, “but working with the specialist teams you’ll be able to ascertain how many people they are currently working with that are going through the system to do some projections about what the need will be into the future. “We do need an analysis of the numbers. And if we don’t have the capacity in New Zealand then we need a concrete plan.” The Ministry was appearing at the Select Committee this morning to respond to a petition led by trans and intersex advocate Tom Hamilton, which urges action “to address the inadequate supply of publicly funded gender reassignment health services, including counselling, endocrinology and surgical services, in New Zealand”. Much of this morning’s discussions focused on gender reassignment surgery, but Green MP Kevin Hague has asked the Ministry of Health to return to the Select Committee again to give evidence on the much wider issues for trans and intersex healthcare the petition and Hamilton’s earlier evidence raised. Chief Medical Officer Don Mackie noted one of these is the way trans and intersex people are treated at the frontline of the health system. He says it’s something he is talking with professional bodies about regularly, and is happy to discuss further. Labour’s Annette King added “this is an area where there is a certain amount of fear around talking about it. But it does remind me of years ago when we didn’t want to talk about stomach stapling either, and we only did four or five a year. And as time went by and there was more understanding of the value of it we now do many, many more in the public system. “And I wonder whether there doesn’t need to be some leadership by the Ministry in this area. Because it is a sensitive area with a lot of misunderstanding by people that this is some sort of ‘lifestyle choice’ … I think there could be better leadership by the Ministry in this whole area.”
Credit: GayNZ.com Daily News staff
First published: Wednesday, 27th May 2015 - 11:52am