Sandyford’s lead doctor, who runs Scotland’s only specialist gender identity clinic for children, said the gender clinics were already following the guidelines issued by WPATH, even when they were in draft form.
Meanwhile, NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde said Sandyford’s gender identity service is “shaped and informed” by WPATH guidelines.
Trina Budge, director of the campaign group For Women Scotland, repeated her call for the Sandyford, which has been branded as “Sturgeon’s Tavistock” and has links to the scandal-hit English clinic, which is due to be closed down.
“It is beyond irresponsible that Sandyford doctors have gotten ahead of themselves with the implementation of the new WPATH treatment guidelines,” he said.
“The addition of this widely discredited treatment protocol that actually lowers the age at which children can access dangerous and experimental drugs is the opposite of the carefully thought out and evidenced good practice that is being introduced in England.”
It added: “When senior NHS staff still deny any connection to WPATH, it is reprehensible that vulnerable children are caught in the crossfire of mismanagement and poor care.”
Child castration and sexual abuse.
Significant concerns have been raised about Sandyford after a senior doctor, in a presentation recorded by a whistleblower, suggested that patients were offered irreversible treatment after only basic mental health evaluations.
He acknowledged that there was no “strong evidence base” for his methods, but that staff saw their main role as “getting them”. [patients] in treatment.”
NHS National Services Scotland has previously tried to distance itself from WPATH.
In the summer, the health service apologized for a scandal in which a WPATH document, including a link to a website with fictional graphic depictions of child castration and sexual abuse, was uploaded to an NHS website.
An investigation classified the bug as a “category 1 event” – the most serious – and the “images of child abuse” led to a referral to Police Scotland, according to internal documents.
On June 23, the NHS said that “it is incorrect to claim that gender clinics follow the WPATH guideline”. He insisted that there were no plans for the updated WPATH guidelines, which were released in September, “to be incorporated or followed.”
On September 28, when asked if the new guidelines would be adopted, the Scottish Government said: “No, NHS Scotland will not adopt these guidelines.”
However, the lead doctor, in a private NHS webinar on June 17, said draft versions of the rules were already being followed in Scotland.
NHS treatment protocol for trans patients
“Obviously we adhere to clinical guidelines,” he said. “WPATH is the World Professional Association for Transgender Health. They are international guidelines to which all gender services adhere.
“We all adhere to these guidelines, they are in version eight of their Standards of Care. So they are not yet fully finalized, but we are adhering to the draft chapters for each of the relevant service areas.”
Other documents show that trans activists from LGBT Youth Scotland, a charity that received nearly £400,000 last year from the Scottish government, have been lobbying behind the scenes for WPATH to be backed in a new NHS treatment protocol for trans patients. .
When the final version of the guidelines was distributed on the NHS in Scotland, one doctor expressed concern that “particularly chapter 9 with the reference to the eunuch…is still there, along with the web link”.
NHS National Services Scotland has been contacted for comment.
