Environmental Scan of Publicly Available Resources for the use of Gonadotrophin-Releasing Hormone Analogues (Puberty Blockers) in Young Gender Diverse People

Background: Some people may experience distress about their bodies developing in
ways that feel incompatible with their gender identity. This is often known as gender
dysphoria, a diagnostic term used in clinical and health settings. Puberty blockers, or
gonadotropin-releasing hormone analogues (GnRHas) are medications that some young
people seek to use to treat gender dysphoria. There is little understanding about the
quality of current internet resources on GnRHa and whether they inform health decision
making. The current study investigated the availability of internet resources on GnRHa
use and aimed to assess the quality of these resources, including the decision-making
quality, clinical accuracy, accessibility, inclusivity, bias, and readability.
Methods: An environmental scan method was used to search for publicly available
resources on internet search engines that included information about the use of GnRHa.
Resources were extracted using relevant search strings and an inclusion criterion.
Accepted resources were assessed using a range of quality assessment tools.
Results: A total of 46 resources were found. Results showed that the quality of clinical
information on GnRHa were greatly varied. The majority of resources were assessed as
difficult to read and five resources presented inaccurate clinical information. Resources
did not score highly for decision-making quality and lacked material that would be
accessible or inclusive to people from diverse backgrounds. Most resources were
assessed as biased as they shared a position on the use of GnRHa.
Discussion: Findings suggest that internet resources on GnRHa were difficult to find
and were of low quality. Better quality resources are needed to fully inform and support
gender diverse youth and their families to be able to make important decisions on the
use of GnRHa.