Group psychotherapy with female-to-male transsexuals in Turkey

The change in Turkish law to allow local sex reassignment surgery was passe d in May 1988. By law, a candidate for such surgery must obtain a medical c ertificate attesting that the operation is necessary. However, the law does not specify conditions for granting such a certificate, so any physician c an give a certificate based on his own criteria. Sex reassignment surgery c an therefore be performed without preoperative psychiatric evaluation and p reparation. This is a report of 40 female-to-male transsexuals. They had co mpleted psychiatric assessment and participated in group therapy. These mee tings provided a valuable setting for getting to know transsexuals and thei r families. Participants' long, regular attendance and low dropout rate dem onstrate high group cohesion. The aim of the study is to report characteris tics of a group of transsexuals living in a different cultural setting from other studies of this patient population in order to identify problems of Turkish transsexuals and advocate changes in current Turkish laws for sex r eassignment.