A relational approach to youth healthcare: Examining young people's, parents' and clinicians' experiences in the context of variations in sex characteristics.

According to popular understandings, children grow from a state of dependence to eventually become independent adults. Interdependence helps to disrupt the in/dependence binary and is a useful concept for making sense of the experiences young people with variations in sex characteristics in relation to healthcare. This study used semi-structured interviews with 32 health professionals, 33 caregivers and 12 young people recruited in the UK and Sweden.

Hypospadias surgery: understanding parental emotions, decisions and regrets.

This paper builds an argument about genital surgery in the context of medical treatment of children and young people with variations in sex characteristics. First, I set out what is known from existing research including psychological research, surgical follow-up studies and parental regret studies. Second, I present an analysis of surgeons' talk about children, young people and parents in relation to genital surgery.

'Does anyone else have this?' The role of emotion in forum discussions about medical conditions affecting sex characteristics.

When people experience rare medical conditions or variations, searching online may be the only way to find others with similar experiences. This study examines what happens when people do just that. The dataset for the research has been generated from online posts by people living with variations of sex characteristics, which some call intersex variations.

Clitoral surgery on minors: an interview study with clinical experts of differences of sex development.

Objectives: Clitoral surgery on minors diagnosed with differences of sex development is increasingly positioned as a violation of human rights. This qualitative study identified how health professionals (HPs) navigate the contentious issues as they offer care to affected families.

Design: Qualitative analysis of audio-recorded semistructured interviews with HPs.

Intersex or Diverse Sex Development: Critical Review of Psychosocial Health Care Research and Indications for Practice.

Intersex or diverse sex development (dsd) can be conceptualized as an aspect of bodily diversity that has particular psychosocial implications. This is a review of psychosocial health care literature, published from 2007 to 2017, focusing on the well-being of people with a diagnosis relating to sex development. The analysis I offer here takes a critical psychological approach, questioning norms and taken-for-granted assumptions.

Shaping parents, shaping penises: How medical teams frame parents' decisions in response to hypospadias.

Introduction: Psychological research provides insights into how parents approach medical decisions on behalf of children. The medical decision of concern here is the surgical alteration of a hypospadic penis, whose urethral opening does not appear at the tip. Hypospadias surgery is routinely carried out in infancy, despite criticism by international organizations concerned about children's rights.

Vaginal Construction and Treatment Providers' Experiences: A Qualitative Analysis.

Study Objective: To investigate specialist clinicians' experiences of treating vaginal agenesis.

Design: Semi-structured interviews.

Setting: Twelve hospitals in Britain and Sweden.

From Knowing Nothing to Knowing What, How and Now: Parents' Experiences of Caring for their Children With Congenital Adrenal Hyperplasia.

Objective: This study investigates various kinds of knowing that European parents use when caring for their children with congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH).

Methods: Semi-structured qualitative interviews with 20 parents of 22 children with CAH.

Results: Parents emphasized the importance of knowing what CAH is and what support their child needs, but also knowing how to cope and make sense of the new situation, how to attend to their child's medical needs as well as how to talk to their child.

The Body as a Site of Gender-Related Distress: Ethical Considerations for Gender Variant Youth in Clinical Settings.

The present article maps out understandings about embodied distress among gender-nonconforming youth. Feminist bioethics and queer-inflected clinical perspectives are used to inform thinking about ethical, nonpathologizing health care in the case of gender-related distress. Specific attention is directed at self-harming among gender variant and trans youth.

"It's Part of Me, Not All of Me": Young Women's Experiences of Receiving a Diagnosis Related to Diverse Sex Development.

Study Objective: To understand young women's experiences of receiving a diagnosis related to diverse sex development.

Design: A qualitative narrative analysis of interviews.

Setting: Karolinska University Hospital.

The psychological impact of a diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease.

Research on the experience of receiving and living with a diagnosis of dementia is sparse. Existing studies have focused on the initial reactions to the diagnosis rather than longer term adjustment and coping. The current study uses interpretative phenomenological analysis to explore personal experiences of receiving a diagnosis and to investigate aspects of the experience of adjusting and adapting to dementia.

Pushing the boundaries: understanding self-harm in a non-clinical population.

This study investigates 122 people's descriptions of their self-harm experiences using thematic analysis. Analysis revealed four themes: What counts as self-harm, What leads to self-harm, Intentions and Managing stigma. Our participants challenged commonly accepted understandings in terms of method, outcome and intentions.

Youth on the virtual edge: researching marginalized sexualities and genders online.

Research shows clear links between lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) youth and deliberate self-harm (DSH), but there is a lack of research investigating the social context of young LGBT people's lives and helping to explain the higher DSH risk. In this article, we report on a small-scale methodological study intended to test the feasibility of online qualitative interviews for investigating young people, sexual and gender identity, and emotional distress. There are many methodological dilemmas arising from researching such sensitive issues with marginalized groups.

The non-display of authentic distress: public-private dualism in young people's discursive construction of self-harm.

This article draws from focus groups and interviews investigating how young people talk about self-harm. Some of the research participants had personal experience of self-harm but this was not a prerequisite for their inclusion in the study. Thematic coding was used initially to organise and give an overview of the data, but the data were subsequently analysed using a discourse analytic approach.

Selling your self? The psychological impact of street sex work and factors affecting support seeking.

Previous research investigating the risks of female street sex work has tended to focus on the most tangible risks to physical health and safety. This is reflected in the provision of support services for sex workers, where these aspects are prioritised. There is little research focusing solely on the psychological risks of sex work.

Extending systematic reviews to include evidence on implementation: methodological work on a review of community-based initiatives to prevent injuries.

Unintentional injury is a leading cause of mortality and disability among young and old. While evidence about the effectiveness of interventions in reducing injuries is accumulating, reviews of this evidence frequently fail to include details of implementation processes. Our research, of which the work reported here formed a part, had two main objectives: (1) to identify evidence about the implementation of interventions aimed at reducing unintentional injuries amongst children and young people; and (2) to explore methods for systematically reviewing evidence on implementation.

Intersex embodiment: when health care means maintaining binary sexes.

The treatments carried out with intersex children for the purpose of helping them live in a normatively gendered world have raised increasing levels of controversy in the past decade. This paper outlines key debates that are taking place highlighting the relevance of critical approaches to evidence. It points to the value of working across disciplines and epistemological frameworks in order to fundamentally re-think existing clinical practice in terms of ethical concerns and in terms of the reported experiences of intersex people.