Effect of Medicaid Expansion on the Crowdfunding Behavior of Transgender Adolescents

Abstract

Given the high rates of suicidality among transgender youth and the success of gender affirmation as an intervention for this population, access to medical transition is a crucial issue for the wellbeing of transgender adolescents. While some states in US have increased access to medical transition through mandating the services’ inclusion in their Medicaid expansion and tying in policy mandating transition related care in private insurance plans, other states have chosen not to. Along with other factors, this uneven expansion has encouraged transgender adolescents to turn to crowdfunding to raise money for transition related care. In this mixed methods ecological descriptive study I compared trends in states with an Medicaid expansion that included access to medical transition for transgender adolescent to those who did not through the lens of crowdfunding practices to pay for a variety of transition related healthcare costs.