The Daily Telegraph

MRI brain scan can reveal if you are transgende­r

- By Henry Bodkin

PEOPLE questionin­g their gender identity could be offered brain scans to determine whether they are transgende­r, according to a study.

Research has revealed for the first time evidence that the brain activity of people who feel they inhabit the wrong body closely resembles that of the gender they want to embrace.

Analysis of around 160 participan­ts showed that biological males with gender dysphoria – the experience of discomfort or distress due to their biological sex – had a brain structure and neurologic­al patterns similar to biological females, and vice versa.

These distinct neurologic­al difference­s are detectable during childhood.

The findings, presented at the European Society of Endocrinol­ogy annual meeting in Barcelona, are likely to provoke controvers­y among groups who argue gender identity should be a matter of personal choice and not medical definition. However, the scientists behind the new research say their discovery promises doctors a potent new tool with which to offer better advice at an earlier stage.

Currently, children complainin­g of gender dysphoria typically undergo psychother­apy.

Prof Julie Bakker, who led the research at the University of Liege in Belgium, said: “We will be better equipped to support these young people, instead of just sending them to a psychiatri­st and hoping that their distress will disappear spontaneou­sly.”

The team used MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) tests to examine brain activation upon exposure to a steroid, and measured grey matter and white matter microstruc­ture using a technique called diffusion tensor imaging.

Theresa May, the Prime Minister, last year pledged to amend the Gender Recognitio­n Act to allow people to legally change gender without medical authorisat­ion. She said: “Being trans is not an illness and it should not be treated as such”.

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