Effect of cross-sex hormones on the quality of life, depression and anxiety of transgender individuals: a quantitative systematic review.

Abstract

Objective: The objective of the review was to evaluate the effectiveness of cross-sex hormone use in improving quality of life and the related measures of depression and anxiety in transgender individuals.

Introduction: Transgender medicine as a specialty is still in its infancy and is beginning to attract more primary care providers. The use of hormones to aid in gender transition is expected to provide benefit with regard to quality of life, but there have been few high-quality studies. Two previous systematic reviews were found. One review included studies where participants had gender-affirming surgery, and the other review considered only prospective studies. Both reviews found a benefit with the use of hormones, despite the lack of high-quality studies. To describe outcomes specifically associated with hormone therapy, this review focused on patients who had not yet had surgical interventions, with an aim to inform primary care providers who are considering providing gender transition related-care in their office or clinic.

Inclusion criteria: Eligible studies included participants who were transgender (trans) women, trans men or who did not identify with the gender binary and were using cross-sex hormones. This review only considered studies where hormone use was under medical supervision. Studies that included participants who already had any form of gender-affirming surgery were excluded, as were studies that did not use a validated tool to measure quality of life, depression or anxiety.

Methods: A comprehensive database search of PubMed, CINAHL, Embase and PsycINFO was conducted in August and September of 2017. The search for unpublished studies and gray literature included Google, the New York Academy of Medicine and the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) Conference Proceedings. No date limits were used in any part of the search. Study selection, critical appraisal and data extraction were conducted by two independent reviewers using the JBI protocols, standardized critical appraisal and data extraction tools.

Results: Seven observational studies met the inclusion criteria for this review. The total number of transgender participants in all the included studies was 552. Population sizes in the studies ranged from 14 to 163. In general, the certainty of the findings was low to very low due to issues with imprecision and indirectness. The use of cross-sex hormones was associated with improved quality of life, depression and anxiety scores, although no causation can be inferred.

Conclusions: Transgender participants who were prescribed cross-sex hormones had statistically significant scores demonstrating improvement on the validated scales that measured quality of life, anxiety and depression when compared to transgender people who had enrolled in a sex-reassignment clinic but had not yet begun taking cross-sex hormones. However, because the certainty of this evidence was very low to low, recommendations for hormone use to improve quality of life, depression and anxiety could not be made. High-quality research on this issue is needed, as is the development of a quality-of-life tool specific to the transgender population.