New analysis of puberty blocker study shows 34% saw their mental health deteriorate while 29% improved

submitted by xoenix from bbc.com

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[–]Hematomato 11 insightful - 1 fun11 insightful - 0 fun12 insightful - 1 fun -  (9 children)

Probably a pretty worthless study. They took 44 children and asked them about their mental health. 15 of them said it got worse, 13 of them said it got better, 16 of them said it stayed the same.

This is not a big enough sample size to generate a useful statistic. If you gave 44 kids sugar pills, you'd sometimes see those exact same numbers and sometimes see wildly different numbers.

[–]HiddenFox 1 insightful - 4 fun1 insightful - 3 fun2 insightful - 4 fun -  (1 child)

I get the feeling you are not "trusting the science" my good sir!

[–]Hematomato 5 insightful - 1 fun5 insightful - 0 fun6 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

lol. I kinda hate how the word "science" has drifted over the course of my life, from "the result of a method of inquiry" to "anything a person with an advanced degree says is true."

[–]alladd 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

why even do it

[–]HiddenFox 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

I get the feeling you are not "trusting the science" my good sir!

[–]IMissPorn 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

You're not wrong. A year probably isn't really long enough to observe much effect either.

But still, I welcome any and all attempts to actually study this.

[–]jet199 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (3 children)

The trouble is that the studies used to promote puberty blockers are pretty much the same and no one questions them.

The 41% trans suicide stat was based on around 30 people.

[–]Q-Continuum-kin 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (2 children)

It was based on a survey which people had to choose to take already knowing it was about suicide.

[–]ClassroomPast6178 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

Look, I did a survey of whether or not people like doughnuts, I left the survey forms beside the till in a Dunkin’ Donuts so people could just pick one up and fill it in. I found 100% of people like or really like doughnuts. Take that Doughnut Exclusionary Radical Diabetics!

[–]Q-Continuum-kin 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

You joke but the suicide survey was conducted by finding trans people in homeless shelters.

[–]clownworlddropout 4 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 0 fun5 insightful - 1 fun -  (4 children)

I want to know why when this data was originally analyzed the authors said it showed "no changes in psychological function."

[–]xoenix[S] 8 insightful - 1 fun8 insightful - 0 fun9 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

I mean none of their studies show anything, and yet all of this stuff is apparently "life saving."

[–]ClassroomPast6178 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Small sample size, different analysis technique with different criteria and wonky data to begin with.

This sort of study is really only good for deciding whether to conduct a larger study. In this case it should raise some concerns and if they were to proceed with a larger study I suspect their ethics board/institutional review board/research ethics committee would require them to be very careful in recording the mental health data, not just asking children whether they felt better but using validated tools and coding techniques.

I did a study looking at mental health during a specific type of radiotherapy for a particular cancer and we had validated tools to capture the data, but we also had a sample size of about 180 patients and it was a very rare cancer, so their sample size and study design is pitiful.

[–]Q-Continuum-kin 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

The overall finding of "no change" was based on a group average - or mean - of those scores, given at different points in time.

This seems really idiotic but they just cancelled out the good and bad results and just yadda yadda yaddaed that into saying no change.

[–]ClassroomPast6178 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

It’s not like “no change” is a positive result. If a medication has no effect then you shouldn’t be prescribing it. Combined with the data that they had that 90 percent or so children with gender dysphoria that weren’t prescribed blockers had their gd resolve by the time they were 18, compared with 100 percent of children prescribed blockers going onto cross-sex hormones. Thats compelling evidence that puberty is the cure for children with gender dysphoria and that puberty blockers have a net negative effect.

However, I think the real issue that this exposes is that the pro-trans side doesn’t want to cure childhood gender dysphoria because if it’s curable then it can’t be used as cover for the middle-aged AGPs.