The hospital is now paying to help undo it.
On Monday, Oct. 26, Texas Children's Hospital in Houston opened what Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton calls the nation's first-ever detransition clinic.
It wasn't the hospital's idea. Paxton's settlement forced it.
What the clinic does
According to the AG's office, it's a multidisciplinary clinic for patients who "previously underwent gender-transition interventions." It offers detransition care through age 21, plus detransition-related OB/GYN care for patients older than 21.
Services include endocrinology, surgery, primary care, fertility counseling, psychiatry, psychology, social work and case management, and speech pathology, Dallas Express and Just the News report.
And here's the part that matters: Texas Children's must fully fund the clinic's services for its first five years. Patients pay nothing.
Why the hospital is paying
Paxton went after Texas Children's under the Texas Health Care Program Fraud Prevention Act for billing Texas Medicaid for what his office calls "unallowable and illegal 'gender-transition' interventions." He secured the settlement in May, and it was fully executed Aug. 5.
What it requires:
- $10 million paid to resolve the claims, with $8,576,000 going to the State of Texas.
- The privileges of five physicians permanently ended, per Dallas Express.
- Hospital bylaws amended so that any doctor who performs these interventions automatically loses staff privileges.
- The clinic open by the end of October 2026. It opened with days to spare.
The settlement says the hospital admits no wrongdoing, Dallas Express reports.
The nurse who spoke up
Credit goes to Vanessa Sivadge, a former registered nurse at Texas Children's who blew the whistle. Under the settlement, $1.7152 million of the State's recovery goes to her, according to Dallas Express.
She announced the opening on X:
> "I think of all the detransitioners who have suffered in silence, been dismissed, and fought desperately to have their voices heard. This win is for them."
Paxton put it this way:
> "In accordance with my settlement with Texas Children's Hospital, the nation's first-ever Detransition Clinic is now open. I will continue to ensure that this clinic provides the care and support that victims of the radical left's gender ideology deserve. Together, we will protect our children and defeat the dangerous ideology that has inflicted irreversible harm on innocent kids."
The surgeon who spoke up first
Credit also goes to Dr. Eithan Haim, a Dallas surgeon who trained at Texas Children's. In 2023 he gave documents to a journalist alleging that the hospital was still treating minors with puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones after publicly saying it would pause that care. For that, he was charged with four federal counts of wrongful disclosure of individually identifiable health information. Federal prosecutors dropped all four charges in January 2025.
My take
Detransitioners are the forgotten people of this whole experiment. They were told puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones and surgery would fix them. When it didn't, too many were brushed aside by the same system that pushed them forward.
Now, in Texas, a hospital has to pay to help them heal. That's what accountability looks like.
It shouldn't take an attorney general and a $10 million settlement. But it did. Every hospital that pushed this on kids should be next.
Thank you, Vanessa Sivadge and Eithan Haim, for speaking up.
Sources: Texas Office of the Attorney General, Oct. 27, 2026 · Texas Office of the Attorney General, Aug. 5, 2026 · Dallas Express, Oct. 26, 2026 · Just the News, Oct. 26, 2026 · The Texas Tribune, Jan. 24, 2025 · Houston Public Media, Jan. 27, 2025
- texas
- detransition
- hospitals
- medicaid
- accountability