During adolescence, the body experiences one of the greatest hormonal reorganizations of life. For young people with gender dysphoria, that process can become an intense source of distress. A question has been on the table for years: does the mental health of these adolescents improve if that puberty is temporarily halted with hormone blockers? A recent study, published in JAMA Network Open (a journal of the JAMA family), has analyzed more than 230,000 medical records in an attempt to answer it.
What puberty blockers are
Puberty blockers are medications that reversibly inhibit the production of sex hormones. They are not new: since the 1960s they have been used in cisgender children with precocious puberty to slow an early development. Decades later they were adapted for gender dysphoria in adolescents, within the so-called Dutch protocol, when it is still considered too early to start hormone therapy.
How the study was done
The research team used a large United States medical claims database, from January 2016 to January 2025. They analyzed 231,783 young people aged 10 to 17, divided into four groups according to their gender identity and whether or not they had received puberty blockers. The objective: to compare the diagnoses of mood disorders and of suicidal thoughts and behaviors among those groups.
First: the weight of dysphoria
Before talking about treatments, the study confirms an important fact. Adolescents with gender dysphoria have much higher rates of mental health problems than the rest: 4.4 times more likely to receive a diagnosis of mood disorder and 12.2 times more of suicidal thoughts or behaviors. That gap reflects the need for specific interventions for this population, beyond the debate over each treatment.
The key finding
The most relevant data comes from combining the two things. Among young people with gender dysphoria who received blockers, the probability of a mood disorder diagnosis was halved (48% less) and that of suicidal thoughts or behaviors fell by 80%, compared with young people with dysphoria who did not receive them.
In raw numbers: 30.6% of young people with gender dysphoria without blockers had received a mood disorder diagnosis, compared with 33.8% of those who had taken them at some point; and in suicidality the difference was 5.6% versus 3.6%. The authors highlight that the benefit appears in the adjusted comparison, which takes into account factors such as age, race or socioeconomic status.
Important nuances
The researchers stress that this type of observational study does not prove cause and effect. Those who receive blockers tend to be precisely those going through the greatest distress, which partly explains why, unadjusted, they show high diagnosis figures. In addition, the authors point out that part of the rise in cases among adolescents could be due to social and environmental factors, and that not all cases of dysphoria have the same biological basis.
What it means for science
It is the largest study to date on this topic using medical claims data, and it adds one more piece to a complex puzzle. Gender dysphoria is a phenomenon with multiple layers: biological, psychological and social. Studies like this help to replace ideological debate with data, step by step, and to better understand which treatments can relieve the suffering of those who suffer it most.
Source: Mental Health of Youths Who Use Puberty Blockers. JAMA Network Open 2026. DOI: 10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2026.23302.
