We are an international group of over 100 clinicians and researchers concerned about the lack of quality evidence for the use of hormonal and surgical interventions as first-line treatment for young people with gender dysphoria. We represent expertise from a range of clinical disciplines.

Our objectives include evaluating current interventions for gender dysphoria, providing balanced evidence summaries, promoting the development of effective and supportive psychosocial approaches for the care of young people with gender dysphoria and generating good, answerable questions for research.

Young people with gender dysphoria deserve respect, compassion, and high quality care. Please join us in our mission to promote evidence-based care for children, adolescents, and young adults that prioritizes life (i.e. measures of mortality), quality of life, long-term outcomes, and fully informed consent. SEGM is free from political, ideological, religious, or financial influences.

SEGM is a registered 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization.
Contributions to SEGM are tax-deductible to the extent permitted by law. SEGM’s tax identification number is 84-4520593.

William Malone, MD (US)

William Malone, MD (US)

Dr. William Malone is a board-certified endocrinologist. He is a graduate of Stanford University (B.A., Human Biology) and New York University Medical School. He completed residency in Internal Medicine and fellowship in Endocrinology, Diabetes, and Metabolism at Los Angeles County/University of Southern California Medical Center. He’s been in clinical practice since 2008 and holds an appointment as an Assistant Clinical Professor of Endocrinology from the Idaho College of Osteopathic Medicine.

Julia W Mason, MS MD (US)

Julia W Mason, MS MD FAAP (US)

Dr. Julia Mason is a board-certified pediatrician and Fellow of the American Academy of Pediatrics. She is a graduate of the University of Illinois (MS in Nutritional Science, MD). She completed residency training in Pediatrics at Children's Hospital Los Angeles. Dr. Mason has a busy pediatrics practice; in the past several years she's encountered increasing numbers of gender dysphoric adolescents, most with neurodevelopmental challenges or psychiatric comorbidities. Dr. Mason contributes to KevinMD on the topic of gender dysphoria.

Marcus Evans, Psychoanalyst (UK)

Marcus Evans, Psychoanalyst (UK)

Marcus Evans is a psychotherapist with over 40 years of experience in mental health as a practitioner, supervisor, lecturer, and manager.  Evans served as associate clinical director of the adult and adolescent service and as head of nursing at Tavistock. He also served on the governor's board at the trust; a role he resigned from in 2018 over the trust's management of the gender identity development service. Marcus Evans is in private practice in Beckenham and continues to teach and supervise.

Roberto D’Angelo, PsyD, MMed, MBBS, FRANZCP (Australia)

Roberto D’Angelo, PsyD, MMed, MBBS, FRANZCP (Australia)

Dr. Roberto D'Angelo is a psychiatrist and psychoanalyst. He is a training and supervising analyst at the Institute of Contemporary Psychoanalysis, Los Angeles. He has written and contributed to publications raising ethical questions about gender-affirming therapies. Dr. D’Angelo has an interest in non-medicalized approaches to gender issues and has written about the psychotherapeutic treatment of gender dysphoria. He is in private practice in Sydney and Byron Bay, Australia, where he sees adolescents and adults with gender issues.

Sasha Ayad, LPC (US)

Sasha Ayad, LPC (US)

Sasha Ayad is a Licensed Professional Counselor who has worked in the field of behavioral therapy and mental health since 2005. Sasha promotes and provides developmentally appropriate, individualized treatments for concerns related to gender identity and gender dysphoria. Sasha has also served populations with autism spectrum conditions and domestic violence victims. Sasha developed and ran the first counseling program at a state-supported residential facility for adults with intellectual disabilities and concurrent mental illness. Sasha Ayad has been in private practice in Houston, Texas since 2016.

Michael Biggs, PhD (UK)

Michael Biggs, PhD (UK)

Michael Biggs was born in New Zealand, took his undergraduate degree at Victoria University of Wellington, and then pursued doctoral study at Harvard University. Currently Associate Professor of Sociology and Fellow of St Cross College at the University of Oxford, Biggs’ research focuses on social movements and collective protest. The transgender movement first attracted his attention for its extraordinary success in changing social norms and government policies. When he looked for empirical evidence to justify medical interventions on children and adolescents, he was surprised that there was so little and it was of such poor quality. His research on Britain’s experiment with puberty blockers has been widely reported in newspapers and on the BBC.

Richard Byng, MB BCh MPH PHD MRCGP (UK)

Richard Byng, MB BCh MPH PHD MRCGP (UK)

Dr. Richard Byng works in Plymouth in general practice and in a mental health team for young people. He is also a Professor in Primary Care Research at the University of Plymouth, leading the Community and Primary Care Group and specializing in the development and evaluation of person-centered care for individuals with complex health and social needs.

Lisa Marchiano, LCSW (US)

Lisa Marchiano, LCSW (US)

Lisa Marchiano is a clinical social worker and certified Jungian analyst. She consults with parents of trans-identifying teens and detransitioners. She is the author of “Outbreak: On Transgender Teens and Psychic Epidemics” (Psychological Perspectives 2017). Lisa contributed chapters to two books about transgender children, adolescents, and young adults published by Cambridge Scholars. Her writing has appeared in the online magazines, Quillette and Areo. Lisa Marchiano has a private practice in Philadelphia.

Stella O’Malley, Psychotherapist (Ireland)

Stella O’Malley, Psychotherapist (Ireland)

Stella O’Malley is a psychotherapist, bestselling author, public speaker and a regular contributor to the Irish media. Stella’s first book, ‘Cotton Wool Kids’, was released in 2015, 'Bully-Proof Kids' was released in 2017 and ‘Fragile', was released in 2019. Stella was the presenter of the Channel 4 documentary ‘Trans - Kids: It’s Time To Talk’ and she contributed a chapter to the 2019 book, ‘Inventing Transgender Children and Young People’. She also co-hosts the podcast Gender: A Wider Lens with the therapist Sasha Ayad. Stella holds a B.A. in Counselling and Psychotherapy, an M.A. in Cognitive Behavioural Therapy and is currently studying for a PhD about gender-related distress in childhood.

Dr. Avi Ring, PhD (Norway)

Avi Ring, PhD (Norway)

Avi Ring earned a PhD in Physiology and Biophysics from the University Uppsala, Sweden where he was an associate professor and worked in cellular electrophysiology. At the Norwegian Defence Research Est. Ring was a chief scientist, working on countermeasures to chemical warfare. Dr. Ring now serves as guest professor at the University of Oslo. Dr. Ring cofounded Gender Identity Challenge (GENID) Scandinavia, where he compiled the web science pages on gender dysphoria.

Sven Román, MD (Sweden)

Sven Román, MD (Sweden)

Dr. Sven Román is a child and adolescent psychiatrist working in both inpatient and outpatient care settings. Dr. Román worked in Stockholm at the largest emergency room for child and adolescent psychiatry in northern Europe serving 500,000 children. Dr. Román also worked at the first unit in the world for youths with suspect psychotic or bipolar disorder. In his work with gender dysphoric young people, Dr. Román has seen a number of young people whose gender dysphoria was secondary to other psychiatric conditions such as autism, self-harm behavior, borderline, depression and eating disorders.

Catherine Williamson, Occupational Therapist and Psychoanalytic Psychotherapist in training (UK)

Catherine Williamson, Occupational Therapist and Psychoanalytic Psychotherapist in training (UK)

Catherine Williamson is an occupational therapist with 20 years of experience in mental health as a practitioner, supervisor and clinical manager. Catherine worked as Multi-Disciplinary Team Leader/Senior Practitioner at the Sheffield Gender Identity Clinic, an adult service in the UK. She resigned in 2019 owing to her clinical concerns about the rapidly-changing demographics and increasing complexity of the patient population, and over the assessment process in NHS gender services.

Colin Wright, PhD (US)

Colin Wright, PhD (US)

Dr. Colin Wright is an evolutionary biologist, receiving his PhD at UC Santa Barbara in 2018. He is currently the Managing Editor at Quillette magazine, and frequently writes about sex and gender. His essays have appeared in online and print media outlets including The Wall Street Journal, Quillette, The Times, and The Australian.

The views, thoughts, and opinions expressed by SEGM advisors are their own and do not necessarily represent the views of their respective employers or institutions they are affiliated with.