'Clementine’s providers deliberately, grossly, and recklessly breached the standard of care in this case,' the lawsuit argues.
A doctor celebrated as “America’s best-known practitioner of youth gender medicine” is being sued for medical negligence by a former patient — a young girl who underwent a gender transition and now feels she was deeply betrayed.
Twenty-year-old Kaya Clementine Breen accuses Dr. Johanna Olson-Kennedy of fast-tracking her attempted gender transition, including puberty blockers, hormones, and a double mastectomy, when she was a young teenager.
Her lawyers argue that Olson-Kennedy, the therapist she referred Breen to, the surgeon who removed Breen’s breasts, and other medical professionals are all guilty of medical negligence for rushing Breen through procedures that have deeply and negatively impacted her future.
“Clementine is a female who suffered from a complex, multi-faceted array of mental health symptoms as a child and adolescent,” the complaint states. “She is also a survivor of multiple instances of sexual abuse as a child and adolescent, something that was never explored, addressed, or discussed by Defendants in the course of their purported treatment.”
The lawsuit continues: “Her presentation of symptoms and concerns included, among other things, anxiety, depression, autism, undiagnosed post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), potential bipolarism, as has been suggested by one of her psychiatrists, ongoing confusion regarding her gender, and eventually psychosis (including audio and visual hallucinations), panic attacks, and paranoia. Her family also has a lengthy history of mental health issues. She needed psychotherapy to evaluate, assess, and treat her complex co-morbid mental health symptoms.”
She didn’t get these things. “Instead, she was fast-tracked onto the conveyor belt of irreversibly damaging puberty blockers (age 12), cross-sex hormones (age 13), and “gender-affirming” surgery (age 14).”
“Clementine’s providers deliberately, grossly, and recklessly breached the standard of care in this case as discussed above, by among other things, failing to adequately assess and treat Clementine’s complex array of mental health symptoms and prior trauma before prescribing irreversible and life-altering medications and performing surgery,” the complaint states.
“Instead, the Defendants coerced Clementine and her parents with the threat of suicide, presentation of false information, and concealment of full information, into an ill-advised experimental course of chemical/surgical imitation sex change treatment that was utterly unsupported by any reliable medical research,” it continues. “This so-called ‘treatment’ of Clementine by her providers represents a despicable, failed medical experiment and a knowing, deliberate, and gross breach of the standard of care that was substantially certain to cause serious harm.”
The lawsuit is one of a number of cases brought by detransitioners in recent years. This one is particularly significant, given that Olson-Kennedy leads the Center for Transyouth at Los Angeles Children’s Hospital and is widely considered the most notable youth gender medicine clinician in the world.
Last month, Olson-Kennedy revealed to the New York Times that she purposefully stopped the publication of a $10 million taxpayer-funded study into puberty blockers and their effects on American children. Olson-Kennedy had hoped the study would show that puberty blockers improve children’s mental health, and her study found no evidence that this was the case.
“I do not want our work to be weaponized,” she told the Times. “It has to be exactly on point, clear and concise. And that takes time.”
Notes from Olson-Kennedy’s meetings with Breen indicate that Olson-Kennedy immediately started Breen on the transition route during their first visit, The Economist reports. Breen had not yet met with a gender therapist nor seen a psychologist about her gender dysphoria, and Olson-Kennedy had not performed a mental-health evaluation, the publication reports.
But three months later, Breen was able to get puberty blockers. Less than a year later, according to The Economist, Olson-Kennedy prescribed her testosterone. And in May 2019, 14-year-old Breen underwent a double mastectomy, removing her breasts forever.
Olson-Kennedy reportedly told Breen’s parents that she was suicidal and would kill herself if they did not agree to cross-sex hormone therapy, the lawsuit alleges.
“At that time, Clementine had never had any thoughts of suicide, and she certainly had never expressed anything along those lines to Dr. Olson-Kenned,” the lawsuit says. “Dr. Olson-Kennedy went even further…by telling them that if they did not agree to cross-sex hormone therapy, Clementine would commit suicide.”
Olson-Kennedy also wrote in a letter to Breen’s surgeon that Breen had “endorsed a male gender identity since childhood,” The Economist reports — a statement that contradicted Olson-Kennedy’s own records, designed to indicate that Breen had long identified as a man and probably wouldn’t regret her surgery.
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