Gender-affirming surgeries in the US nearly tripled before pandemic dip, study finds

By CARLA K. JOHNSON
AP Medical Writer

A new study finds the number of gender-affirming surgeries in the United States nearly tripled from 2016 to 2019. That’s a timespan when insurance coverage was expanding. Breast surgeries were the most common type, followed by genital surgeries. The study was published Wednesday in the journal JAMA Network Open. Researchers say about 48,000 patients underwent surgeries from 2016 through 2020. The peak year was 2019 with about 13,000 procedures. Surgeries in patients 18 and younger were rare — fewer than 1,200 in the highest volume year.