Eating disorder symptomatology in transgender patients: Differences across gender identity and gender affirmation

Past studies have reported high rates of eating disorder (ED) symptomatology among transgender people, yet without consideration of gender affirmation. The primary objective of this study was to evaluate the relationship between gender identity, gender affirming interventions such as gender affirming hormones (GAH) and gender affirming surgeries (GAS), and ED symptomatology.

Transgender patients at a primary care outpatient gender health program in the United States completed a survey consisting of demographics, medical history, and clinical variables, including the Eating Disorder Examination Questionnaire (EDE-Q). Multivariate analyses of covariance were conducted to compare EDE-Q scores across gender identity and gender affirmation.

Compared to transgender men (n = 79), transgender women (n = 87) reported higher EDE-Q scores and significantly higher Eating Concern. Compared to hormone/surgery-naïve and hormone-experienced/surgery-naïve patients, hormone/surgery-experienced patients had lower EDE-Q scores. Hormone/surgery-experienced patients reported significantly lower Shape Concern and marginally lower Global Score and Weight Concern than hormone-experienced/surgery-naïve patients. There were no differences in EDE-Q scores between hormone/surgery-naïve and hormone-experienced/surgery-naïve patients.

Transgender patients report high levels of ED symptomatology. There are subtle, yet important, differences in ED between gender identities and gender affirmations. High ED prevalence may result from the dual pathways of sociocultural pressures as well as gender dysphoria. Both GAH and GAS may be effective interventions to support gender affirmation and thereby alleviate ED symptomatology. While the potential positive benefits of GAS on ED are more apparent, the effects of GAH are less clear.