The Next Frontier in Fertility Treatment (NYT alert)

New York Times ^ | January 12, 2014 | SARAH ELIZABETH RICHARDS

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ANDY INKSTER, a transgender man, had always wanted biological children. So when he embarked on the transition from female to male at age 18 — changing his name, taking testosterone and eventually undergoing surgery to remove his breasts — he left his female reproductive organs intact.

In his mid-20s, he decided it was time. He stopped taking testosterone and started trying to get pregnant. Eventually, in 2009, after beginning graduate school at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, he sought fertility treatment at Baystate Reproductive Medicine. Baystate was one of the few clinics in the country with an anti-discrimination policy for gender identity. And yet, it refused to treat him, arguing that it didn’t have enough expertise to treat transgender patients. Mr. Inkster insisted there was no medical reason to deny him; his baby-making parts were the same as any woman’s.

The more than 700,000 transgender people living in the United States have long faced discrimination by health care providers. Over the past 15 years, activists have fought to compel insurers to cover transgender-related health care — from hormone therapy to gender reassignment surgery — or at least be prevented from excluding transgender clients from buying policies for basic services. Finally, starting this month, thanks to the Affordable Care Act, “transsexualism” can no longer be considered a pre-existing condition. What’s been left out of the spotlight: having babies. Many Americans have come to accept gay parents; the transgender community is next in line for recognition.

Mr. Inkster eventually found another clinic that helped him conceive via in vitro fertilization and donor sperm, and in October 2010, he gave birth to a daughter, Elise. A month later, he sued Baystate for sexual discrimination.

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