Gender-affirming care
This is family medicine.
Hormone therapy, the bloodwork that goes with it, the paperwork for surgery, and the ordinary screening everybody needs — provided by the same clinicians who look after your blood pressure and your chest infection.
How we work
We follow an informed consent model, which is the standard set out in the Ontario guidelines for gender-affirming primary care. In practice that means the conversation is about whether you understand the effects, the risks, what is reversible and what is not, and what monitoring is involved — not about proving anything to anyone.
You don’t need a psychiatrist’s letter to start hormone therapy here, and you don’t need a referral to become a patient.
That is not the same as no assessment. There is a real clinical conversation, there is baseline bloodwork, and there is follow-up — because hormone therapy is ongoing medical care and monitoring it properly is part of doing it well. What there isn’t is a gate you have to argue your way through.
What we provide
- Starting hormone therapy, on an informed consent model
- Continuing hormone therapy you already take, including transfers from another provider
- Baseline and ongoing bloodwork, collected in the building
- Dose reviews and adjustments over time
- Assessments and OHIP prior-approval paperwork for surgery
- Referrals to surgical programs and to other services
- Screening and preventive care organized by anatomy, not by gender
- Sexual health care, HIV prevention and treatment, and contraception
- Ordinary family medicine — everything a family doctor does
- Support letters for changing your name and gender marker where a clinician’s letter is required
- Start or continue hormone therapyInformed consent. No psychiatrist’s letter.
- What happens at your first appointmentStep by step, before you book
- Bloodwork and monitoringOn site, so it isn’t a separate trip
- If you’re already on hormonesTransferring your care
- Surgery assessments and OHIP paperworkAssessments and prior approval
- Screening and preventive careOrganized by what you have, not by gender
- Changing your name and IDWhere to get free legal help
What we don’t do
Being clear about the edges matters more than sounding comprehensive, so: we do not perform surgery. What we do is the assessment and the prior-approval paperwork that has to happen before a funded procedure, and the referral into a surgical program.
About funding for surgery
OHIP funds specified genital and chest procedures, and those require prior approval before surgery happens. Some procedures are not publicly funded at all, and some related services — electrolysis, laser hair removal, and privately delivered voice therapy among them — are generally not covered.
We will tell you which category the thing you are asking about falls into before you invest time in it. Wait times for surgical programs are set by those programs and vary considerably; we will not guess at one for you.
We also don’t change your legal name or your gender marker — that is a government process, and there is free, experienced help for it in this city. The 519’s Trans ID Clinic does this work, and ServiceOntario handles the filings. Where the process needs a letter from a clinician, we can write it.
Screening, organized by what you have
Screening should follow anatomy and history, not the gender on a health card. If you have a cervix, cervical screening applies to you. If you have prostate tissue, prostate screening applies to you. Hormone therapy changes some of the thresholds and some of the reference ranges, and that is a detail for the clinician to get right rather than something you should have to manage.
You will not be asked to explain your body to a receptionist, and you will not find a “men’s health” or “women’s health” menu on this site. Care here is organized by what you need.
Common questions
Do I need a letter from a therapist or psychiatrist?
No. We follow an informed consent model. If you are already working with a therapist and want them involved, that is welcome, and if you would like a referral to mental health support we can make one — but it is not a precondition for starting hormone therapy.
Do I need a referral to become a patient?
No. You can come to the walk-in, or ask to be taken on as a family practice patient. Both routes reach the same clinicians.
What does it cost?
Appointments are billed to OHIP. With an Ontario health card, visits and the bloodwork that goes with hormone therapy are covered the way any family doctor visit is covered. What your prescriptions cost is a separate question, and usually a program answers it — see paying for hormone therapy.
I already take hormones. Can you take over my prescriptions?
Yes. Bring whatever you have — a prescription, a bottle, a lab result, the name of your previous provider, or none of those. Continuity matters more than paperwork, and we would rather keep you on treatment while we sort out records than interrupt it.
What if I started hormones outside the medical system?
Tell us. It is common, it is not something you will be lectured about, and knowing what you have actually been taking is what makes what happens next safe. Bloodwork and a dose review are usually the first steps.
Will my chosen name and pronouns be used?
Yes, in conversation and everywhere our systems allow it. Some fields are bound by law to your legal name — health card billing among them — and we will tell you plainly which those are rather than letting you discover it at a counter.
Do you see people who aren’t sure yet?
Yes. An appointment is not a commitment to anything. Coming in to ask questions and leaving without starting treatment is a completely ordinary visit.
Kind Pharmacy is on the ground floor of the same building, and its gender-affirming service line covers the part that happens after the prescription: injection teaching and supplies, sharps return, your chosen name on the label, and help with coverage paperwork. Kind Clinic and Kind Pharmacy are separate businesses under common ownership. You can fill your prescription anywhere.
Kind Pharmacy →