Transgender prescribing

Whilst this is not an area that many GPs will be familiar with, it has been a national issue because specialist clinics have sought to offload the prescribing of complex and unfamiliar hormone treatments to GPs. NHS England and the GMC have been less than supportive and seemingly resistant to pleas from GPs who quite rightly say they cannot prescribe these drugs because they do not have the necessary knowledge or expertise. The GMC’s response was effectively that GPs should “go and learn!” There does however now seem to be a glimmer of understanding from NHS England that this approach presents a problem and is in nobody’s interests, and that in the future, these important services will need to be appropriately commissioned. They have produced a consultation document and every LMC in the country has been asked to respond. We therefore need your help. If you have any experience of patients requesting gender reassignment, we would like to hear of your experiences, good or bad, particularly in relation to the interaction with the specialist clinic, so we can respond appropriately to the consultation. Please email Dr Mark Corcoran, Chairman Avon LMC at markcorcoran@nhs.net making sure of course that the information contains no identifiable data.  We would be grateful for any responses by the end of August.