A Rare Cause of Acute Pancreatitis in a Transgender Female

Acute pancreatitis is defined as an acute inflammation of the pancreas and is most commonly caused by gallstones and alcohol followed by elevated triglycerides and medications. Estrogen as a cause of secondary hypertriglyceridemic pancreatitis is a rare but known phenomenon in females on hormonal therapy; however, it is not well described in the transgender female population. In this article, we present a case of a 31-year-old transgender female who developed acute, severe pancreatitis after a few months of using estrogen as transition therapy. To our knowledge, this is the third case report of a transgender female presenting with acute pancreatitis secondary to estrogen. Long-term supraphysiologic doses of sex hormones are required to maintain secondary sex characteristics placing this population at a higher risk of developing acute pancreatitis. Further research is needed to determine risk and screening methods to prevent this side effect.