View the Database

How to Help Out

<aside> 🏳️‍⚧️

Click below to proceed ↴

MTL HRT Providers

</aside>

<aside> 🏳️‍⚧️ Are you receiving hormone therapy? Please share your experiences by filling out our survey ! Patient data is how we build and update this resource.

</aside>

Overview

<aside> 🏳️‍⚧️ The Montreal Trans Patient Union’s HRT Project is a patient data-backed index of doctors, clinics, and practices. It is intended to provide both at-a-glance and detailed information to people seeking out gender-affirming hormone therapy in the Tio’tia:ke (greater Montréal) region, so that they can make informed decisions about who to engage for care.

</aside>

How to Use

<aside> 🏳️‍⚧️

Our index covers all HRT providers we have received patient feedback for since our last update. You can find common, necessary at-a-glance information for comparison between doctors in its columns, as well as some additional information about each doctor’s practices by clicking “Open” on their name in the list. Each clinic links to its website, where you can find their contact email and phone number.

As clinic wait list times are always changing, we strongly encourage you to call and/or email as many clinics and get on as many wait lists as possible, rather than fixing your sights on one specific doctor. You can always transfer between care providers later.

Other important Montreal & Quebec HRT resources:

Megalist of Montreal HRT Providers

List of Guides to Medical Transition in Quebec

List of Guides to Gender-Affirming Care for Medical Professionals

</aside>

Standards of Care

<aside> 🏳️‍⚧️

Ideally, trans care should:

• Educate you. You should be informed about the what, how, and why of the changes you’re making to yourself.
• Offer you options, not dictate a path. You should be able to make choices about the specifics of what you’re doing with your own body, such as the method of hormone delivery or cosmetic concerns for surgery.
• Be furnished in a respectful fashion. You should not experience overt transphobia or microaggressions, or be subjected to antiquated requirements such as genital examinations or real-life experience testing.

For detailed, established guidelines, you may wish to consult the Rainbow Health Ontario Sherbourne’s Guidelines for Gender-Affirming Primary Care with Trans and Non-Binary Patients (2023), the WPATH Standards of Care (2022) and the UCSF Guidelines for the Primary and Gender-Affirming Care of Transgender and Gender Nonbinary People (2016)

</aside>

Patient Self-Advocacy

<aside> 🏳️‍⚧️

We strongly encourage trans patients to be informed about and engaged in the process of their own medical care. To that end, you should endeavor to:

• Do your own research on and speak to to other trans people about HRT. Doses, prescribed formulations, target hormone blood levels, and the like vary from provider to provider, and are often based on personal preference and belief rather than broad consensus, care standards, or more established science (much as it exists).
• Verify any statements your provider makes that seem strange or questionable. They aren’t infallible, and can be misinformed or simply mistaken. If something sounds off to you, do your research into the topic, ask other patients who have relevant personal medical experience, and if possible, get a second or third medical opinion.
• Be aware of, and be prepared to push back against, “trans broken arm syndrome”. While less common with trans care providers in specific, medical practitioners have a problematic tendency of assuming any illness or issue you’re experiencing is the result or fault of HRT. By knowing what the medicine you’re taking does (and does not do), you can better facilitate the medical care you need. </aside>

Don’t have Quebec public health insurance (RAMQ)?

<aside> 🏳️‍⚧️

Can I go to a public health clinic without RAMQ?

• Generally, public clinics will see those without RAMQ, but will require patients to pay out of pocket. We have tried to note any exceptions on our list.
  • A notable exception is hospitals, which will directly bill both out-of-province insurances and private insurance companies. This makes them a good choice for booking blood tests which you can do on the Clic Santé website. Unfortunately some hospitals do not accept external referrals.

Private insurances

• If you have a private insurance, you can get reimbursed after the fact using their process.
• If you only have private insurance and no public provincial insurance you are likely better off going to private clinics; your wait times will be significantly shorter and you have to pay out-of-pocket either way.
• Many private doctors will prescribe HRT even if they have no prior experience, as private doctors are generally more amenable to giving patients what they ask for.

Out-of-province insurances

• If you are from out-of-province you should expect the clinic to give you a receipt, proof of payment, and ideally an out-of-province reimbursement form. Not all provinces have these, and the clinic you are going to may not have them on hand. However you can always find them online. You will then have to mail all the forms and typically your province will reimburse you whatever the service would have costed in your home province </aside>

This resource proudly brought to you by the Montreal Trans Patient Union.

<aside>

The Montreal Trans Patient Union

The Trans Patient Union is an advocacy and mutual aid collective by and for trans and nonbinary patients at McGill and in broader Tio’tia:ke (colonially known as Montreal).

https://transpatientunion.org/

</aside>

Instagram • Facebook • Resources Index • Mailing List