A transgender woman is a person assigned male sex at birth who identifies as a woman. With the numbers of transgender identity on the rise, encountering a transgender woman requiring routine surgery is becoming more common in anaesthetic practice. The perioperative period can be challenging for transgender women, but these challenges can be mitigated by a skilled and sensitive perioperative team. Engagement with patients and their primary physicians is important. Whilst there are anaesthetic issues relevant to both transgender women and men, there are many issues unique to transgender women. This article focuses only on considerations for the perioperative care of the transgender woman. This narrative review provides an overview of the factors influencing the safe care of the transgender woman presenting for routine surgery, including the potential social and pharmacological factors to consider, and anatomical changes to be aware of from previous gender confirming or feminisation surgeries that can influence clinical decisionmaking.

Introduction. Concomitant cholecystitis and gallstone pancreatitis is an infrequent clinical encounter, reported sparsely in the literature. Concurrent acute cholecystitis and pancreatitis complicated by gall bladder perforation has not been reported before. Presentation of Case. We report a 39-year-old female presenting with concomitant cholecystitis and acute pancreatitis, complicated by gallbladder perforation. Discussion. There is much controversy surrounding the timing of cholecystectomy following gallstone pancreatitis, with the recent literature suggesting that “early” operation is safe. In the current case, gallbladder perforation altered the “routine” management of gallstone pancreatitis and posed as a management dilemma. Conclusion. Clinical judgement dictated timing of operative management and ultimately cholecystectomy was performed safely.

Recent years have seen an increase in the number of people openly identifying as transgender in the UK, with current estimates ranging between 200 000 and 600 000 individuals. There has also been an increase in the number of patients undergoing both medical and surgical gender-affirming treatment. There are several important, specific considerations that perioperative clinicians must be aware of when caring for transgender patients, including changes to the airway, potential respiratory and cardiovascular complications, and the management of hormone therapy. Alongside this, important general considerations include the correct use of patient pronouns and ensuring patients are admitted to correctly gendered wards. Despite the need for these considerations, the perioperative management of transgender patients is not covered in the Royal College of Anaesthetists' curriculum; to date, no national guidelines exist on the subject. This article discusses some of the key, specific perioperative considerations relevant to transgender patients, and highlights the need for national guidelines and improved education on the subject.

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