Boston, November 8, 2023 – Fenway Health announces the launch of Gender-Affirming Psychiatric Care, the first textbook in the field of psychiatry to provide an affirming, intersectional, and evidence-informed approach to caring for transgender, non-binary, and/or gender-expansive (TNG) people. Co-edited by Alex S. Keuroghlian, M.D., Director of the Division of Education and Training at The Fenway Institute and Teddy G. Goetz, M.D., M.S., Resident Physician in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, Fenway Health will host a launch party for Gender-Affirming Psychiatric Care on Thursday, November 16 from 6 p.m. in the 10th Floor Auditorium at 1340 Boylston Street, Boston.
“Demand for state-of-the-art psychiatric care for transgender, non-binary, and gender expansive people of all ages continues to grow,” said Keuroghlian, who is also Associate Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and Director of the Massachusetts General Hospital Psychiatry Gender Identity Program. “This textbook will be an invaluable resource to clinicians working in the field of psychiatry who care for transgender, non-binary, and gender expansive children, adolescents, and adults of all ages.”
“Medical education on gender-affirming care has lagged far behind clinical demand. In this textbook, we provide clinicians with the rigorous and thorough examination of evidence-informed and affirming care practices that they need to provide optimal patient care,” said Goetz.
Gender-Affirming Psychiatric Care integrates cutting-edge neuroscience, clinical research, best practices, mental health systems design, and mental health policy. Contributors to Gender Affirming Psychiatric Care, 90 percent of whom identify as TNG, offer an expert view from psychiatry, psychology, social work, nursing, pharmacy, public health, law, business, community activism, and more. Each of the 26 chapters of Gender-Affirming Psychiatric Care features at least one TNG author, ensuring that wisdom from lived experience is woven throughout the textbook and informs all of the topics covered.
Gender-Affirming Psychiatric Care opens with a discussion of epidemiology, the neuroscience of gender, and psychopharmacological considerations for prescribing with TNG people. The rest of the textbook provides an in-depth examination of the following topics:
- Intersectional, gender-affirming care for marginalized communities such as Two-Spirit and Indigenous, Black, Asian American, Pacific Islander, disabled, migrant, refugee, and unhoused people
- Developmentally appropriate care for TNG people, from childhood and adolescence to older age
- Gender identity affirmation in the context of eating disorders, substance use disorders, pregnancy, and serious mental illness
- The specific care needs of populations who have experienced the traumas of incarceration and gender identity conversion efforts
- The necessity of systems-level change, including collecting gender identity information in electronic health records, building gender-affirming clinical environments, and mental health law and policy considerations
Gender-Affirming Psychiatric Care is published by APA Publishing, a division of the American Psychiatric Association. APA Publishing is the world’s premier publisher of books, journals, and multimedia on psychiatry, mental health, and behavioral science.