Gender dysphoria: Difference between revisions

In early 2013 the American Psychiatric Association published a [http://web.archive.org/web/20160929074553/http://www.dsm5.org/Documents/Gender%20Dysphoria%20Fact%20Sheet.pdf 'Gender Dysphoria Fact Sheet'] on their website which states: «In the upcoming fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5), people whose gender at birth is contrary to the one they identify with will be diagnosed with gender dysphoria. This diagnosis is a revision of DSM-IV’s criteria for gender identity disorder and is intended to better characterize the experiences of affected children, adolescents, and adults... DSM not only determines how mental disorders are defined and diagnosed, it also impacts how people see themselves and how we see each other. While diagnostic terms facilitate clinical care and access to insurance coverage that supports mental health, these terms can also have a stigmatizing effect... DSM-5 aims to avoid stigma and ensure clinical care for individuals who see and feel themselves to be a different gender than their assigned gender. It replaces the diagnostic name “gender identity disorder” with “gender dysphoria,” as well as makes other important clarifications in the criteria. It is important to note that gender nonconformity is not in itself a mental disorder. The critical element of gender dysphoria is the presence of clinically significant distress associated with the condition... Part of removing stigma is about choosing the right words. Replacing “disorder” with “dysphoria” in the diagnostic label is not only more appropriate and consistent with familiar clinical sexology terminology, it also removes the connotation that the patient is “disordered”».<ref name=":0">http://www.dsm5.org/documents/gender%20dysphoria%20fact%20sheet.pdf</ref> The fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5) was published in May 2013.<ref>http://web.archive.org/web/20160921075302/http://www.dsm5.org:80/about/Pages/DSMVOverview.aspx</ref>

Kelley Winters, Ph.D., is a writer on issues of trans* medical policy, founder of GID Reform Advocates and an Advisory Board Member for the Matthew Shepard Foundation and TransYouth Family Advocates. She has presented papers on the psychiatric classification of gender diversity at the annual conventions of the American Psychiatric Association, the American Counselling Association and the Association of Women in Psychology. In the GID Reform Weblog she maintains, she writes:-

''"The new revisions for the Gender Dysphoria diagnosis in the DSM-5 are mostly positive. However they do not go nearly far enough. The change in title from Gender Identity Disorder (intended by its authors to mean “disordered” gender identity) to Gender Dysphoria (from a Greek root for distress) is a significant step forward. It represents a historic shift from gender identities that differ from birth assignment to distress with gender assignment and associated sex characteristics as the focus of the problem to be treated... In another positive change, the Gender Dysphoria category has been moved from the Sexual Disorders chapter of the DSM to a new chapter of its own. Non-binary queer-spectrum identities and expression are now acknowledged in the diagnostic criteria... However, the fundamental problem remains that the need for medical transition treatment is still classed as a mental disorder. In the diagnostic criteria, desire for transition care is itself cast as symptomatic of mental illness, unfortunately reinforcing gender-reparative psychotherapies which suppress expression of this “desire” into the closet. The diagnostic criteria still contradict transition and still describe transition itself as symptomatic of mental illness. The criteria for children retain much of the archaic sexist language of the DSM-IV-TR that psychopathologizes gender nonconformity. Moreover, children who have happily socially transitioned are maligned by misgendering language in the new diagnosis. More troubling is false-positive diagnosis for those who have happily completed transition. Thus, the GD diagnosis, and its controversial post-transition specifier, continue to contradict the proven efficacy of medical transition treatments. This contradiction may be used to support gender conversion/reparative psychotherapies – practices described as no longer ethical in the current WPATH Standards of Care".''<ref>https://gidreform.wordpress.com/2013/06/13/gid-reform-in-the-dsm-5-and-icd-11-a-status-update/</ref>