Created: 15/12/2025 - Last updated: 03/01/2026
I'm genderqueer and have decided to seek treatment for gender dysphoria in the country I currently live in, Finland. Here are my notes about how it's going for future reference.
To get gender-related treatment in Finland (whether we're talking HRT, surgeries or else), one needs to go through a Gender Identity Clinic (or to a private clinic, which costs a lot of money). There are two Gender Identity Clinics in Finland, one in Helsinki (the capital) and one in Tampere. I will attempt to go through the Helsinki one, so this article only applies to this one, although both processes should be similar.
The expected timeline towards gender-related treatment as of writing this article seems to be: some months to get a referral and for it to be accepted, 2-3 years going through the Clinic before getting a diagnosis, and then if the patient does get their diagnosis, then the treatment can start, some immediately (like HRT), some with a delay (some surgeries can only be booked one year after the diagnosis, and on top of this there's usually a 6 months queue before getting any surgery due to lack of nurses).
The first step in this long journey is to get a referral to the Gender Identity Clinic (Sukupuoli-identiteetin tutkimusvastaanotto, in Finnish).
The basic criteria a patient must fullfil for a referral are:
To get a referral, one should go to any regular doctor (GP) and ask for a referal. This can be either a public healthcare GP (by calling their local health station) or a private one, the difference might be cost and waiting time. The doctor has to give a referral, and it's not their job to investigate whether their patient is "really trans", or to refer them to a psychiatric unit instead, or anything of the sort - the Gender Identity Clinic will do all the investigating. The association Trasek has a helpful document which outlines patients' rights regarding Gender Identity Clinic referral, which one can bring to the GP appointment in case the GP has no idea where to start. Referrals to the Gender Identity Clinic are frequently rejected if they don't contain enough information, or for any number of reasons, so if possible it's best to go to a doctor that one trusts. HUS has a webpage outlining what the referral should contain.
Knowing the name of a private doctor whose referrals to the Gender Identity Clinic supposedly always go through, I was thinking of going to him until I realized that one appointment with him cost at least 350€... So I decided to start with the public instead (it should cost 20€), and to keep him in mind as a last resort only!
Finally gathering my courage, I called my health station on Monday, December 15th at 8am and asked for a callback for a non-urgent appointment. When they called me back around 10.30, I had to repeat "I would like an apppointment with a doctor to get a referral to the Gender Identity Clinic" three times before I finally said the Finnish name of the clinic and the person on the phone went "Ah, so you don't know if you're a man or a woman, and you need help with this?"... Sure. Great start. I explained that I know "what I am" (I didn't want to go too deep into the details with this person who clearly didn't know much about the subject) and that I wanted treatment. They asked me since when have I felt this way, and I answered since 2018. Finally, they told me that there's a free time on the 29th of December, but when I asked what doctor would it be with, they gave me the name of a doctor I didn't want (due to previous bad experiences with them), so I asked to change it. Turns out, I was unknowingly in a special healthcare pilot program, and although changing doctors is usually easy, in my case I had to go to the health station, sign a few documents and wait three weeks for the change to be done before I could try to get an appointment again. I hesitated, but I really felt like this doctor would make things very difficult, so I decided to make the change on that same day. Let's try again in three weeks!
On the same day, I also sent an email to my former psychologist to warn them about the fact that I was starting a process to get treatment in the Gender Identity Clinic, and that the people there might contact them to get information about me. I told them that I wouldn't mind them saying that I came out to them many years ago, but that I didn't want any of my other information to be shared with the Gender Identity Clinic.
Even though the health station had told me it would take 3 weeks to change doctors, I decided to check after two weeks and it had been done already! The secretary was also much more chill, she was able to check what the previous person had written on the 15.12 and just said "So you want an appointment about your gender?" and "Is this for the start of the treatment or the continuation?" and that was it. I got an appointment! It's in one month, but the important part is that I got it.
In addition to the links below, I have some additional advice made by trans people living in Finland which I don't want to share publicly, so you can contact me if you want to take a look at them. They include scans of the Gender Identity Clinic questionnaires, as well as lists of trans-friendly services.