For transgender youth in crisis, hospitals sometimes compound the trauma
ABC News
A North Carolina hospital network is referring transgender psychiatric patients to treatment facilities that do not align with their gender identities
CHAPEL HILL, N.C. -- Four days of waiting in UNC Hospitals’ psychiatric emergency room left Callum Bradford desperate for an answer to one key question.
With knots in his stomach, the transgender teen asked: “Will I be placed in a girls’ unit?”
Yes.
The answer provoked one of the worst anxiety attacks Callum had ever experienced. Sobbing into the hospital phone, he informed his parents, who fought to reverse the decision they warned would cause their son greater harm.
Although they succeeded in blocking the transfer, the family had few options when a second overdose landed Callum back in UNC’s emergency room a few months later. When the 17-year-old learned he was again scheduled to be sent to a girls' inpatient ward, he told doctors the urge to hurt himself was becoming uncontrollable. The exchange is documented in hospital records given by the family to The Associated Press.
