Gender Reassignment Surgery – A review of Medical History
The first genital reconstructive surgery was undertaken between about 1930 and 1960 by urologist Hugh Hampton-Young and other surgeons at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore.
The demand for surgeries did not truly take off until about the 1950’s by which time new techniques had been pioneered by Lawson Wilkins. Surgery on infants with ‘uncharacterized’ or ‘ambiguous’ genitalia were particularly prominent around this time and Wilkins’ technique allowed for ‘unwanted’ genitalia to be removed and a birth certificate issued with some certainty declaring whether a child was indeed a ‘boy’ or a ‘girl’!
However, time would show that clearly defining genitalia through operative procedures did not necessarily mean that the doctor’s or indeed the parents had got the ‘gender identity’ of the infant right and often, such children would grow through infancy and into their teens as people feeling as though they were trapped in the wrong body. This is the condition commonly known as gender dysphoria where ones sense of who we really are does not match up with our physical sexual characteristics.
The recent case of German internet pop sensation Kim Petras is a case in point. Born as Tim Petras, Kim apparently knew from age 2 onwards that ‘he’ was really a ‘she’ and dressed as a girl, displayed all the mannerisms and behaviors of a girl and grew her hair like a girl. Her case is possibly one of the most astonishing documented yet. She began hormone therapy at age 12 and was accepted for full gender reassignment surgery in late 2009 to officially become Kim Petras, thought to be the world’s youngest ever sex reassignment patient.
Research into the many possible variations of reassignment surgery was continued on by a pediatric psychologist named John Money who conducted extensive research into the earlier procedures carried out by Hampton-Young.
With the sexual revolution, the 1970’s and 1980’s were critical decades in the development of surgical techniques for gender reassignment. It was true then as it is to this day, that male to female (MtF) reconstructions were easier for surgeons than the corresponding female to Male (FtM) surgeries simply because it was (and still is) easier to construct a vagina than it is to create a functioning penis.
Through time surgery on infants has become less and less recommended however, the number of adults undergoing gender reassignment surgery has increased through time. The new e-book titled “Trans-gender Society – An In depth look into Gender Identity Disorder” is soon to be released and this work will delve deeply into subjects including the history of surgical procedures on infants and adults alike.
This new e-book will be an invaluable resource for all those who suffer from gender identity disorder and who want a complete reference for themselves, family and friends.
About the Author
Ashley Stevenson is a journalist who supplements his income with a home based internet marketing business selling information products. For information about the product which is the subject of this article click through one of these links.
http://genderidentityandreassignment.blogspot.com/2010/07/development-of-gender-and-gender.html
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