Total Patient Care: The Child with an Intersex Condition

Overview

This film is addressed to medical and mental health professionals, but is quite accessible to a lay audience as well. "Intersex" is the general term used to denote a variety of conditions in which a person is born with mixed sex anatomy. It is important to note that intersex conditions sometimes involve "ambiguous genitalia" but that intersexuality is not always evident from an external examination. Intersexuality may be caused by congenital adrenal hyperplasia, mixed gonadal dysgenesis, androgen insensitivity syndrome (complete or partial), 5-alpha reductase deficiency, and many others. The traditonal standard of care held that normal gender identity could be assigned through genital plastic surgery and by limiting information given to parents and patient. Many patients were subjected to multiple surgeries. This film outlines the problems with many current practices and provides guidelines for a new standard of care that is more advanced scientifically and ethically.