A young woman who thought for years she was non-binary or a transgender man is suing two doctors and Monash Health for negligence, claiming gender treatment that included having both breasts surgically removed had caused her “significant injury”.
Mel Jefferies, a 33-year-old who was born as female and is now living again as a woman, has launched the civil lawsuit in the Victorian County Court.
One of the defendants in the case is Dr Jeff Willcox, a Melbourne GP with an “interest in gay men’s health, sexual health … and transgender health”. The others are Jaco Erasmus, a psychiatrist with a special interest in transgender health, and Victoria’s largest public health service, Monash Health.
Jefferies’ statement of claim, recently lodged with the court, accuses all three of falling short of delivering professional standards of care, including those outlined by the widely recognised World Professional Association for Transgender Health. The claim says those standards require doctors to ensure that “anyone experiencing mental health conditions must have these well-managed and thoroughly controlled prior to the commencement of the testosterone treatment”.
Her statement of claim says she has a permanently “deepened voice, hirsutism, clitoromegaly [a clitoris significantly larger than normal], vaginal pain/discomfort, abnormal body odour and acne, and pelvic floor dysfunction (as indicated by urinary incontinence).”
Her case, filed by Slater and Gordon solicitor Anne Shortall, is one of the few brought in Australia by people who regret their gender treatment. Another is working its way through the courts in Sydney.
If Jefferies’ case proceeds to a judicial decision, it could represent a test case for the duty of care doctors owe towards people seeking affirming care. It comes as the number of young people seeking treatment for gender dysphoria has increased dramatically in the past decade.
Jefferies claims the treatment exacerbated her self-harm, increased her suicidal thoughts, helped prompt drug overdoses and “the need for repeated psychiatric hospitalisations”. She now has complex and chronic post-traumatic stress disorder, is in partial remission from “alcohol misuse disorder”, and has suffered “irreversible and serious injury to her physical body”, the court documents allege.
Lawsuits have been brought and settled in the past over similar issues. A claim in 2003 against the Monash Gender Dysphoria Clinic was settled, but prompted a review by the chief psychiatrist. That found the clinic’s psychiatrists were not rigorous enough in applying diagnostic criteria.
Another legal claim made public in 2009 – two years before Jefferies started treatment – prompted the Monash clinic to close for three months and the forced resignation of its director. Another review followed, which found the clinic needed “better responses to meet the mental health needs of clients”.
Jefferies has requested a judge-only trial, two of the defendants want a jury.
Source: 12ft