The nosological position of transsexualism

Transsexualism, a behavioral state assuming increasing contemporary significance, is examined here as to its nosological position within psychiatry. Clinical features are compared with schizophrenia, affective psychoses, neuroses, personality disorders, perversions, and paranoid syndromes. Transsexualism is also compared to other disorders with regard to sexual drive, erotic interests, and responses to castration and behavior therapy. No standard psychiatric category of mental disorder comfortably embraces the syndrome of transsexualism. Its nosological uniqueness characterizes our dilemma over etiology, diagnosis, and treatment.