Care of Gender Diverse Youth with Obesity.

PURPOSE OF REVIEW: The relationships between gender identity, body image, and gender expression are complex, requiring a gender affirming approach to address weight management. This purpose of this review is to describe the essentials to caring for gender diverse youth, as well as the differences and intersections among those with obesity. RECENT FINDINGS: Gender-affirming hormone therapy may lead to abnormal weight gain and increased body mass index, or worsen obesity and exacerbate weight-related complications. Moreover, given the high prevalence of victimization, marginalization, and stigmatization among gender diverse people and youth with obesity, care guidelines and treatment goals should also include reducing the negative impact of social-related complications. Despite the overlap in clinical care and lived experiences that impact the health of gender diverse youth with obesity, there is very little research to help guide clinicians. Careful attention to medical and behavioral comorbidities, barriers to care, and health disparities can inform clinical practice. Future research that specifically addresses nuances to care for gender diverse youth with obesity can help to establish standards of care to address their unmet needs and further support clinicians, patients and their families.

Caring for the transgender adolescent and young adult: Current concepts of an evolving process in the 21st century.

The term transgender youth commonly refers to those whose gender identity, or personal core sense of self as a particular gender, differs from their assigned sex at birth; this is often designated by what external genitalia are present. These youths are presenting to multidisciplinary clinics worldwide at exponentially higher rates than in decades past, and clinics themselves have grown in number to meet the specialized demands of these youth. Additionally, the scientific and medical community has moved towards understanding the construct of gender dimensionally (i.e., across a spectrum from male to female) as opposed to dichotomous or binary "male or female" categories. This is reflected in the American Psychiatric Association's Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, fifth edition (DSM 5); in this publication, the diagnostic classification of gender dysphoria, GD, (which has two subtypes: childhood and adolescence/adulthood) provides a set of criteria that many transgender people meet. GD describes the affective distress that arises as a result of the incongruence between gender identity and sex anatomy. The DSM uses language to indicate that a person may identify as another gender instead of the other gender, which further captures the complexity of the human experience of gender. Also, research regarding how current adolescents are describing their identity development and experience along this spectrum within today's society is only now being addressed in the literature. Therefore, the clinical needs of the transgender population have outpaced medical training and scientific advancement, which has opened up gaps on how to define best practices. This article provides current concepts of evaluation and management for transgender persons with emphasis on hormonal therapy (i.e., puberty blockers and gender affirming hormone therapy). Other management issues are briefly considered including gender confirming surgery and changes in the face as well as voice.

Development and validation of a Patient-Reported Oral Mucositis Symptom (PROMS) scale.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE: Oral mucositis, a painful condition with potentially life-threatening sequelae, often develops in association with allogeneic bone marrow transplantation. This condition has an adverse impact on the oral-health-related quality of life of patients undergoing marrow transplantation therapy. The purpose of this study was to create and validate a Patient-Reported Oral Mucositis Symptom (PROMS) scale. This scale allows evaluation of symptoms of oral mucositis that threaten quality of life. MATERIALS AND METHODS: The PROMS scale was compared with previously validated tools measuring quality of life (Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy--Bone Marrow Transplant), symptoms of depression (Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale), psychological well-being (Affect Balance Scale) and stressful life events, as well as an objective, clinician-rated assessment of oral mucositis (Visual Analogue Scale--Oral Mucositis Assessment Scale). Thirty-four patients who were to undergo allogeneic bone marrow transplantation at Princess Margaret Hospital in Toronto, Ontario, were enrolled in this validation study. RESULTS: The PROMS scale had high internal reliability, as well as good convergent and discriminant validity relative to subjective measures of well-being. Longitudinal assessments showed that changes in PROMS scores were strongly correlated with changes in clinical assessment of oral mucositis over the first 2 weeks after transplantation, when the onset of oral mucositis typically occurs and the lesions are most severe. CONCLUSIONS: Oral mucositis in patients who have undergone bone marrow transplantation can be quantified reliably with the easily administered PROMS scale. The PROMSscale provides a valid measure of the impact of oral mucositis on the oral-health-related quality of life of patients affected by this malady.

Research and Evaluations of the Health Aspects of Disasters, Part VI: Interventional Research and the Disaster Logic Model.

Disaster-related interventions are actions or responses undertaken during any phase of a disaster to change the current status of an affected community or a Societal System. Interventional disaster research aims to evaluate the results of such interventions in order to develop standards and best practices in Disaster Health that can be applied to disaster risk reduction. Considering interventions as production functions (transformation processes) structures the analyses and cataloguing of interventions/responses that are implemented prior to, during, or following a disaster or other emergency. Since currently it is not possible to do randomized, controlled studies of disasters, in order to validate the derived standards and best practices, the results of the studies must be compared and synthesized with results from other studies (ie, systematic reviews). Such reviews will be facilitated by the selected studies being structured using accepted frameworks. A logic model is a graphic representation of the transformation processes of a program [project] that shows the intended relationships between investments and results. Logic models are used to describe a program and its theory of change, and they provide a method for the analyzing and evaluating interventions. The Disaster Logic Model (DLM) is an adaptation of a logic model used for the evaluation of educational programs and provides the structure required for the analysis of disaster-related interventions. It incorporates a(n): definition of the current functional status of a community or Societal System, identification of needs, definition of goals, selection of objectives, implementation of the intervention(s), and evaluation of the effects, outcomes, costs, and impacts of the interventions. It is useful for determining the value of an intervention and it also provides the structure for analyzing the processes used in providing the intervention according to the Relief/Recovery and Risk-Reduction Frameworks.