MONDAY, Jan. 6, 2025 (HealthDay News) — Among privately insured U.S. adolescents who identified as transgender and gender-diverse (TGD), receipt of puberty blockers and hormones was rare from 2018 to 2022, according to a research letter published online Jan. 6 in JAMA Pediatrics.

Landon D. Hughes, Ph.D., from Harvard University in Boston, and colleagues sought to estimate the frequency of puberty blockers and gender-affirming hormone use in U.S. adolescents (aged 8 to 17 years) who identified as TGD. The analysis included 2018 to 2022 data from roughly 5.16 million adolescents identified in the Merative MarketScan Research Database of private insurance claims.

The researchers found that the rate of receiving puberty blockers was 20.81 per 100,000 adolescents assigned female at birth (AFAB) and 15.22 per 100,000 adolescents assigned male at birth (AMAB). The rate of receiving puberty blockers before age 14 years to AFAB adolescents was slightly higher than AMAB adolescents. Per 100,000 AFAB and AMAB adolescents, the rate of receiving hormones was 49.9 and 25.34, respectively. After age 14 years, hormone receipt rates increased but remained low, peaking at age 17 years at 140.16 per 100,000 for AFAB adolescents and 82.42 per 100,000 among AMAB adolescents. Hormone prescription before age 12 years did not occur.

“These rates may be the highest estimates, with lower rates expected among those with less comprehensive private insurance, Medicaid recipients, and the uninsured,” the authors write.

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