The SAIFIP of San Camillo-Forlanini in Rome. When healthcare takes care of Transgender people
Katya Parente's dialogue with Dr. Maddalena Mosconi
We know. Of the rainbow people, already a minority in themselves, the T people are those who, even in the community, are the most marginal and discriminated against. Yet transsexuality has always existed and in every culture: the Native American two-spirits are perhaps the best-known example.
It is only for a (relatively) short time that the medical community has taken charge of it, no longer with "corrective" intentions, but to help transgender people live well in their own skin, trying to dismantle the many clichés, prejudices and stigmas that still surround.
Our welcome guest is Maddalena Mosconi, psychologist, psychotherapist and psychodiagnostician at the “Navigando i Confini” Day Center of the ASL Roma2 and head of the “Minors Area” – Service for the Adaptation between Physical Identity and Psychic Identity (SAIFIP), Hospital Company S.Camillo-Forlanini, Rome.
What is SAIFIP and who is it aimed at?
The Service for the Adaptation between Physical Identity and Psychic Identity (SAIFIP), S.Camillo-Forlanini Hospital of Rome, is an interdisciplinary service aimed at children, adolescents and adults with Gender Incongruence, which in the literature is defined as “a marked and persistent incongruence between the individual's experienced gender and their assigned sex” (WHO, 2018), already called Gender Dysphoria (DSM-5, code 302.85) before the ruling of the World Health Organization in 2018. The Service is aimed not only at people with this condition, but also at their family members , who necessarily have to face a journey together with that of their children.
I assume that your type of work involves multiple areas. How many and which specialists work at you?
L 'team multidisciplinary team is made up of psychologists, psychotherapists, surgeons and endocrinologists.
What services does the facility offer?
The services offered by SAIFIP are many: psychological interviews, individual and group psychotherapy, psychodiagnostic evaluation, "Peer Navigator" desk (people who have completed the course many years ago, and who help those who have just started), job orientation desk , support groups for parents of children, adolescents and adults. Another important part of our work consists of the training of social-health workers, school teachers and anyone who needs training on the topic.
Do you also collaborate with other local entities?
Our work is a network, which necessarily implies collaboration with the territory, and in particular with the territorial services aimed at minors (TSRMEE) and those aimed at adults (DSM), for the care of people who also present other issues beyond those related to gender identity. We also collaborate with schools of all levels, for children and adolescents following the transition path. Collaboration may be necessary with general practitioners and primary care pediatricians.
Many figures involved, many things to do. The path is tortuous, and certainly still long. But it is doable, and it will end when everyone understands that sex "is not between the legs, but between the ears", as I read in an information leaflet from Arcigay.
