Own Study

Subjects

The present series consists of the 43 transsexuals who consulted my superior or myself at the Research Institute at Ulleraker Hospital in Uppsala, or at St. Jörgen's Hospital in G6teborg, or who were referred to our hospital by colleagues or the Royal Medical Board, during the period of time extending from April 1963 to December 31, 1965. Thirty. two were referred to me by colleagues: 20 by psychiatrists, 4 by child psychiatrists, 4 by plastic surgeons, 2 by endocrinologists, and 2 by specialists in internal medicine; 3 were referred by the Royal Medical Board; and 8 came to me directly.

Thirty of the 43 were men, and 13 women. None were under 15 years of age and none showed any signs of psychosis when I interviewed them.

The following figures give the ages of the patients expressed in whole years at the time I first saw them:

The men did not differ significantly from the women, either in their distribution by age or in their mean age. The range for the men was 18 to 49 years and the mean age 27.2 and the corresponding figures for the women were 18 to 45 years and 28.6 respectively.

Two of the men and I of the women were foreign citizens, and I man was a naturalized Swedish citizen. None of the 4 had come to Sweden specially for help with their transsexualism.

Sixteen of the remaining men were born in towns and 11 in rural parishes, and the corresponding figures for the women were 6 and 6, which about corresponds to the urban/rural distribution in Sweden as a whole. But there were too few cases to draw any definite conclusions in this respect. The birthplaces of the Swedish-born were spread over nearly all the counties in Sweden.

The diagnosis of transsexualism was made according to the operational definition just described. It was based on the observations I made on personal examination of the patient, and in no case was it considered final until the patient had been under observation for at least six months.