Indiana Planned Parenthood expands gender-affirming care capacity at statewide clinics

IPB News | By Lauren Chapman

Published September 19, 2024 at 3:22 PM EDT

Planned Parenthood Great Northwest, Hawai‘i, Alaska, Indiana, Kentucky has expanded its capacity to offer gender-affirming care services in Indiana. The organization said it hopes to meet the need of transgender Hoosiers seeking care.

Gender-affirming care is health care that encompasses mental, social, medicinal and surgical care designed to treat gender dysphoria. And gender dysphoria is a clinically significant distress experienced by people whose gender assigned at birth and gender identity don’t match — though not all transgender people experience gender dysphoria.

Erik Janson is the director of gender-affirming hormone care for Planned Parenthood. He said clinics before were only able to intermittently offer services — often by sharing practitioners between locations.

“I think that the demand has been there for quite a while and folks have been struggling to find those health services,” he said.

Planned Parenthood now offers gender-affirming hormone care, hair preservation, surgery coordination and other medical transition support. Patients also have access to navigators who can help update legal documents and find LGBTQ+ friendly mental health care.

“Now we have folks trained in every clinic and people can access care, pretty much immediately. Almost to the point if they wanted to walk-in, same day, and say, ‘hey could I have an appointment?’” Janson said. “We’d probably be able to fit them in that day.”

Janson said gender-affirming care is in a “more robust place” with better research and better educated providers.

“We don’t have a judgment, these days, around cancer provisions. But 50-60 years ago, people talked about that in hushed voices that ‘so-and-so has cancer,’” he said. “Well, we evolve with the times. And again, we know that this is life-saving care.”

Janson said gender-affirming care provides an economic benefit to Indiana.

“Being able to provide this care allows people to be their best selves and participate in society,” he said. “And that is only a strength for the state of Indiana.”

Janson also said Planned Parenthood is using the informed consent model for gender-affirming care, allowing patients to access care without a therapist’s diagnosis. Care is only available to patients 18 and older.

This article was originally published by Louisville Public Media.