Vanderbilt University Medical Center (VUMC) has abruptly announced that it will no longer perform “gender-affirming” plastic surgeries on adult patients, citing “operational limitations and lack of surgical coverage.”
VUMC says that while it will no longer offer sex-change surgeries for adults, it will continue to provide “nonsurgical gender-affirming care for adults 19 years and older,” according to Fox 17 WZTV in Nashville.
“We are in the process of contacting our patients regarding these changes,” VUMC noted. Patients scheduled for these types of surgery started receiving notices from VUMC on Friday that the surgeries were no longer going to take place.
While “gender-affirming” care is legal for adults in the Volunteer State, a bill (HB 2498/SB 2118) that would ban such treatments from being covered or reimbursed for by TennCare is currently being debated in the Tennessee General Assembly, and is likely to pass.
Under Tennessee law, healthcare providers are prohibited from performing or administering to underage children “gender-affirming” medical procedures or treatments – including puberty blockers, hormone therapy, and sex-change surgeries – for the purpose of enabling the child to identify with the opposite gender. That law was affirmed by the U.S. Supreme Court in a 6-3 decision last year in the landmark case U.S. v. Skrmetti.
Local LGBTQ+ leaders say the hospital’s decision is an abandonment of their community. Transgender advocates say options for transgender care and surgery are extremely limited in Tennessee. “The next nearest place is a few hundred miles to the south or a few hundred miles to the north,” said Dahron Anneliese Johnson of the Tennessee Equality Project.
“I’ve heard from a lot of trans folks who were on the list to have consults, to have surgery later this year and they received a letter Friday saying they were no longer on the list,” Olivia Hill, Metro Council member at-large and chair of the Metro Council’s LGBTQ+ Caucus, told Fox 17. Hill hinted that VUMCs decision is in part a reaction to criticism from the Metro Nashville LGBTQ Caucus, which issued a public letter to VUMC last summer, criticizing the hospital for ending transgender procedures for children before the state law, releasing patient records to the state attorney general, and withdrawing from Nashville’s Pride festival.
Conservative analyst and TriStar Daily Editor Steve Gill said he believes the hospital’s decision is directly tied to the proposed legislation and the debate over taxpayer-funded care. TennCare, the state’s Medicaid program, uses public dollars to cover certain medical procedures, including, in some cases, gender-affirming surgery.
“[VUMC’s decision] is because insurance coverage, whether it’s TennCare or other insurance coverage, won’t pay for it,” Gill said. “So what you have Vanderbilt University Medical Center deciding is, if we can’t get paid for it, we’re not going to do it. So it’s not really a moral or cultural decision. It’s a money decision.”
Gill pointed out that the question of public funding for transgender healthcare remains a central aspect to the situation. “If, as an adult, you’re going to pursue this path, you know, that’s your decision,” Gill added. “But when you’re using my tax dollars, when you’re using my money, then it makes it a different decision, and I have a right to interject my view of how you are using my money.”
Gill also advised that if the transgender community wants to hold fundraisers and contribute their own money to pay for these surgeries, he is sure VUMC would consider reversing course based upon the fact that they would receive compensation for the expensive surgeries. “It’s all about the Benjamins, or perhaps the Benjaminas,” Gill noted.
