Costs

[Steph.TS]

How much cost HRT cost? Also how much does GRS, FFS, and vocal surgery cost?
If possible please mention it in Canadian currency values.

[sandra-leigh]

How much cost HRT cost? Also how much does GRS, FFS, and vocal surgery cost?
If possible please mention it in Canadian currency values.

HRT are prescription drugs, covered under whatever health insurance you have (e.g., my employer has a health benefit plan.) If you do not have employer health insurance but are a citizen or landed immigrant, you can probably get access to a provincial health-care plan. The ones I know of have deductables (on the order of $500 per year) after which they cover everything except a reduced fixed-cost dispensing fee.

I have not investigated the costs of the other items. Some employer plans will pay for some or all of them if you can get a medical certification that they are necessary for your health. My employer will cover GRS in theory -- some people in a distantly related department have had it done (there was a court case on the matter that was one by the trans person.)

What few plans will cover is anything they can get away with calling "cosmetic surgery". Don't be surprised if you cannot get coverage for FFS or vocal surgery: there are odd-looking and odd-sounding people of both sexes and it could potentially be ruled that they are "cosmetic". But it would depend on your coverage.

Some provinces such as Alberta have delisted GRS except for those people waiting in the queue, claiming that since there were so few people affected and the costs were high, that this was just a pure operational decision to deploy the funds where they could do the most good.

I have heard there is pressure in Manitoba to increase funding for trans services.

[Steph.TS]

I am in Alberta, so that's why I'm looking at this, I just don't know what to expect cost wise, and if I can see the price, hopefully it's cheap enough I can afford it, otherwise I may have to be pre-op or move to another province...

[Stephenie S]

Here goes.

Therapy: $50 to $250 per hour. Usually several months will do it.

Endo: More expensive, but far less frequently. With lab costs my endo can run as high as $600 a visit. It is not always that high.

Electrolysis: $5,000 to $6,000

Clothes: You name it. $10,000?

FFS: $40,000 Not always necessary.

SRS:$20,000 in Montreal. Cheaper in Thailand

There is no such thing as voice surgery. Fortunately you can learn to speak like a woman for free. It just takes practice.

If you are careful and lucky, you can transition for less than $50,000. In Canada, you have the NHP. This will help, but it takes a bit longer and some provinces are more generous than others.

Stephie

[CharleneT]

For the dose I take of Estrogen, it costs me about $60 a year. You could easily take nothing but estrogen and it would work fine, just a little slower.

[sandra-leigh]

FFS: $40,000 Not always necessary.
SRS:$20,000 in Montreal. Cheaper in Thailand
There is no such thing as voice surgery.


Voice surgery does exist (http://www.tmeltzer.com/procedures/mtf.shtml#voicesurgery). Apparently the technical term is "cricothyroid approximation"

I noticed you posted those figures for FFS and SRS in another thread. I would have expected those two costs to be reversed -- would have expected SRS to be much more complicated.

[Stephenie S]

No, no. Don't perpetuate this myth. Yes, there are some surgeons who CLAIM to do voice surgery. But in reality it's NOT the length of the vocal chords, but the resonance of the mouth and head vrs the chest that distinguish a female sounding voice from a male (and other things). Shorten the vocal cords all you want, it won't work. It doesn't work. Responsible surgeons do not perform this procedure.

Talking like a woman is FREE. Why risk losing your voice altogether to some quack? With all we spend on other things, saving a little money becomes kinda important.

[CharleneT]

I noticed you posted those figures for FFS and SRS in another thread. I would have expected those two costs to be reversed -- would have expected SRS to be much more complicated.

Actually FFS is highly variable, depends on which procedures you choose. BUT in general you will spend more on it than SRS by a large margin. Many would say that $40,000 is low. SRS prices vary as well. In Thailand there are very reputable surgeons who do the basic SRS for $10,000. You can go from there to around $28,500 here in the US. I do not know the prices in the UK or Australia.

[Stephenie S]

Brassard in Montreal is $18,000 CA, right now. And that includes a week at the residence, a pretty luxurious recovery house with round the clock nursing care and delicious meals, a gorgeous manicured yard, park and river view, and lovely rooms. Hard to beat that. Yes Thailand is cheaper, but it's much further away.

FFS is, as someone already stated, much more expensive. It's hard to get away for less than$40,000. You could spend more easily, depending on what you had done. Some of us can get away without it, but not many. And the older you get the more you may need it.

Electrolysis is another $6,000. You should start this yesterday. No matter what anyone tells you, the bearded lady look is out this year.

$500 should get you a nice hairpiece.

A new wardrobe? Who knows. How much do you want to spend?

Therapy? Again, who knows? $1000 should get you started. Hormone therapy is relatively cheap. $10 to $20 a month at WalMart. Have I left anything out? I budget for nails, pedicures, and a hair appointment every month or so. I buy quality classic clothes so a few pieces can last me a while. Paperwork can cost a few hundred. BC, SS, DL, CCs all can carry a small fee.

You can transition for less than $50,000 if you are lucky and careful. You can easily spend $100,000 if you want the works. Just how important is it to you? Many people spend $30,000 on a new car every few years. Where are your priorities?

Stephie

Oh, for your $18,000 you get state of the art surgery by one of the world's foremost SRS surgeons and a pussy that makes other doctors say, "Oh, wow!"

[sandra-leigh]

A page that I found (http://www.voicedoctor.net/surgery/cta.html) appears to discuss voice surgery fairly.


The surgery is for patients whose voice pitch is consistently interpreted as male, despite concerted efforts at altering pitch. For instance, patients who are perceived as males when on the telephone.

Pre and post-operative voice practice and therapy is essential as the surgery only truncates the lowest pitches, it does not change speech patterns, intensity, resonance or inflection characteristics of the male voice into a female pattern.

In fact, your original voice in falsetto will sound the same after surgery as before surgery. The surgery prevents or limits dropping back down into the chest voice but doesn’t alter the quality of the falsetto voice. The surgery then doesn’t change the voice, it limits it. This can be a desirable limitation by relieving the effort of always trying to keep the voice up in falsetto. It also generally prevents an inadvertent drop into a deeper voice at an inopportune moment. [...]

Not a miracle, but of assistance after alternatives have failed.

[Kaitlyn Michele]

If you have to ask how much...you can't afford it... kidding

anyway...

electrolysis/hair removal... $10-$20 k
HRT anywhere from $20-$100/month (plus $ for bloodwork if you want to be safest)
FFS procedures cost $3-$10k each...meaning for nose, for brows, jaw...etc..the more you need the more it costs...it can be $40-$50k or more for full blown ffs
SRS $15-$20ish k...+/- depending on which surgeons you pick

voice surgery is truly a last resort. you are probably better off going for the gravely old lady voice than getting surgery...imho

[luvSophia]

electrolysis/hair removal... $10-$20 k
HRT anywhere from $20-$100/month (plus $ for bloodwork if you want to be safest)
SRS $15-$20ish k...+/- depending on which surgeons you pick

In my experience this is a much better guesstimate for electrolysis. I have had 100 hours so far at $50/hr and I'm thinking I have another 50 hours to go.
Basic HRT meds can be had from Walmart for $3/30 days without insurance
I have $15K budgeted for my SRS in Thailand. SRS + Breast Augmentation + Tracheal shave is ~13, airfare about $1K and $900 for hotel expenses.

[Anna the Dub]

In my experience this is a much better guesstimate for electrolysis. I have had 100 hours so far at $50/hr and I'm thinking I have another 50 hours to go.
Basic HRT meds can be had from Walmart for $3/30 days without insurance
I have $15K budgeted for my SRS in Thailand. SRS + Breast Augmentation + Tracheal shave is ~13, airfare about $1K and $900 for hotel expenses.


I have had about 200 hours of electrolysis so far (at £37 per hour), and reckon I have about 50-70 hours still to go. If you are particularly hirsute (like I was) the costs of facial hair removal can be pretty astronomical. I cannot afford to go every week now for my hourly appointment, I tend to go to about 3 appointments over 5 weeks.

[Stephenie S]

Sandra. There is no such thing!! Period. Read your quote carefully.

This argument is silly. You can LEARN feminine speech. Free. No dangerous surgery. If there WAS such a thing, all major SRS surgeons would be doing it. They don't. Why? 'Cause it's dangerous, it doesn't work, and it CAN make the situation worse.

This is a myth. A pleasant one to be sure. But a myth, just like alligators in the sewer. Wouldn't we all like a nice feminine voice with no effort? Sure we would. But it ain't possible. We have to LEARN to talk like a woman, just like natal women do. Women aren't BORN talking like that. They LEARN it. You can too. It just takes practice.

I know you read about this on the internet, but you can read about a cream that gives you DD breasts on the internet too. Another myth.

Stephie

[Kaitlyn Michele]

PLUS
dont forget that most of us are going to want hair removal in places other than electrolysis...its much better to overestimate the costs going in and hope you can get a better result

there are lots of hidden costs too
a good example of forgetting hidden costs is a friend that drove 35 miles (70 round trip) to get an electroligist session with a GOOD electrologist (getting good results is NOT guaranteed and some have hit the 300 and 400 hour milestone)....
that 70 mile trip is an extra $5 bucks a session and if you do 200 sessions thats another $1k..and thats just one example

another is all the money you will spend on healing!! bandages, aspirin, vaseline, aloe, skin products etc etc etc.....
i went in assuming i would spend $150,000. its a sad truth for us...imagine the house you could buy with a $100k downpayment!!

[Frances]

I am at about $33,000 with therapy and hair removal only. SRS in paid in Quebec and my hormones were paid by my insurance at work. The new insurance coverage is 80%, so I will have to start paying a part of the hormones. I cannot have FFS or hair plugs or breast implants, as the expense so far put me in bankruptcy and destroyed my credit.

[Stephenie S]

Sweetie, you don't NEED FFS, hair plugs or breast implants. You are already gorgeous.

Stephie