About
JM Jaffe
Trans Health Consulting is a project created and operated by JM Jaffe, who now serves as the Executive Director of Lyon-Martin Community Health Services. JM earned a BS with honors from Wesleyan University with a double major in Biology and Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, and completed all Pre-Medical course requirements. In 2018, after 8 years of working at Lyon-Martin Health Services in San Francisco, CA, JM created Trans Health Consulting, LLC to further access to trans health education nationally. JM's work as Trans Health Manager at Lyon-Martin focused on provider education, policy advocacy, and direct patient care. As a trans person, JM is all too familiar with the barriers trans communities face in accessing health care. Working to improve access to trans health and working with the trans community directly is not just their career, but their passion.
Training & Technical Assistance
As the manager of Lyon-Martin's Project HEALTH (Harnessing Education, Advocacy, and Leadership in Transgender Health) and as a content expert in transgender health, JM facilitates workshops and in-depth medical didactic trainings on a variety of transgender health topics for current and future medical and mental health providers, health professionals, insurance companies, employers and schools. They have carried out technical assistance strategic planning to help clinics and hospitals integrate transgender health care organization-wide--from front desk to operations, from Human Resources to insurance navigation and billing, from mental health to medical health care provision. They have experience with SO/GI data collection implementation and are familiar with many different electronic health record systems. JM also manages Lyon-Martin's student clinical rotation in transgender medicine for healthcare providers in training and serves as the administrative lead in the curriculum development and management of Lyon-Martin's Nurse Practitioner Residency Program. They co-developed Lyon-Martin's self-injection training class for trans clients starting hormone therapy, co-lead trans therapy groups, developed Lyon-Martin’s intake forms and patient education handouts, and started Lyon-Martin's binder exchange program. JM also has an on-going contract with St. Francis Hospital’s new Gender Institute, helping to develop and implement hospital-wide initiatives to improve the experience of trans clients seeking both primary and surgical care there.
TransLine & Protocol Development
JM is also the administrative manager of the TransLine, Lyon-Martin’s collaborative transgender medicine e-consultation service, in which trans health experts from Lyon-Martin, the Mazzoni Center, Fenway Health, Chase Brexton, and Howard Brown answer requests for curbside consultation on trans health issues from providers all over the world. JM also serves as a consultant themselves on the TransLine for questions posed regarding insurance coverage and navigating denials and appeals. In this role, JM additionally facilitates a trans health workgroup consisting of experts in transgender care across the country, not only those that staff the TransLine, but also trans health experts from Callen-Lorde, Legacy Health, Whitman-Walker, Care Resource Center, and the LA LGBT Center. The current aim of this workgroup is to achieve consensus across organizations on protocols for gender affirming hormone therapy. The first draft of our hormone therapy prescriber guidelines were finally released on the TransLine website in April 2019 and are updated periodically as new studies become available.
Policy & Advocacy
JM is active in policy advocacy efforts, participating in legislative visits with city and state representatives and federal health officials alike. They are a co-chair of the National LGBT Primary Care Alliance and serve on the Transgender Advisory Committee for the Office of Trans Initiatives of the Mayor of the City and County of San Francisco; they are a member of California's LGBT Health & Human Services Network, the World Professional Association of Transgender Health, and the National Association of Community Health Centers. With the Trans Advisory Committee, they played a role in successfully lobbying for multi-million dollar city funding of Our Trans Home SF, a campaign to end homelessness for transgender San Franciscans through educating existing shelters, rental subsidies, trans-specific emergency housing, and trans-specific long-term housing. Recently, they were accepted into the Women’s Policy Institute’s 2020-2021 Local Community Health Policy cohort. They are also spearheading the 2020 Save Lyon-Martin campaign.
Insurance Navigation
JM has assisted hundreds of clients updating identity documents to reflect their gender identity and obtaining insurance approval for the coverage of gender affirming surgery. They have the knowledge and expertise necessary to assist with appeals of unlawful denials of gender-affirming surgeries. JM first advocated successfully for UCSF to begin to perform gender affirming surgeries like mastectomy, hysterectomy and orchiectomy on trans patients with SSI benefits in 2010. They then worked collaboratively with Lyon-Martin's community advisory board, the Transgender Law Center, and San Francisco's Department of Public Health to lift the exclusions of gender affirming surgeries in Healthy San Francisco, a city-funded coverage program for the uninsured. JM was instrumental in obtaining coverage for the first vaginoplasty known to be covered by Medi-Cal in 2011. Since then, they have continued to assist clients in overturning denials through a variety of Managed Care Medi-Cal and commercial insurance plans, negotiating with surgeons, hospitals, insurance companies, and the Department of Managed Health Care. Through the appeals process, JM was also instrumental in obtaining coverage of the first phalloplasty, facial feminization surgery, gender-affirming voice therapy, and facial electrolysis treatments known to be covered by Medi-Cal as well. This work has slowly helped change the landscape of gender affirming surgery coverage and access in San Francisco and California more broadly, and has since been replicated in other states across the country. They have experience obtaining coverage for mastectomy, hysterectomy, metoidioplasty, phalloplasty, breast augmentation, orchiectomy, vaginoplasty, facial feminization surgery, tracheal shave, voice therapy, and hair removal. As of 1/1/20, they have helped obtain coverage for over 750 surgeries, 136 hair removal referrals, and 33 voice therapy referrals.
Board Membership
JM formerly served as Secretary of the St. James Infirmary Board of Directors, a peer-based free clinic in San Francisco for current and former sex workers, assisting with the program development and launch of Our Trans Home SF, the first trans-focused housing program in the US.
Awards
2020 San Francisco Trans Day of Visibility Champion of Change Awardee.
Publications
Jen Hastings, Ben Geilhufe, J. M. Jaffe, Jenna Rapues, Colt St. Amand (2023). Creating Inclusive, Gender Affirming Clinical Environments. In MB Moravek & Gene De Haan (Eds.). Reproduction in Transgender & Non-Binary Individuals: A Clinical Guide. Pages 177-207. Springer.
Presentations Available Online
Blasdel, G., & Jaffe, J. M. (2019, September). Supporting Your Patient in Appealing an Insurance Denial. Poster session presented at the United States Professional Association of Transgender Health, Washington, DC.
California Health Care Foundation (CHCF) California Improvement Network (CIN). (2016, May). Required Reading on Transgender Health
News Features
City & County of San Francisco (2022, November) “San Francisco Launches new guaranteed income program for trans community.” San Francisco, CA.
Crego, Pau & Jaffe, JM. (2022, March) “Guest Opinion: Addressing discrepancy in care: CA's TGI Inclusive Care Act.” San Francisco, CA. Bay Area Reporter.
Lew, Sam (2020, March) “Trans-Inclusive SF clinic may close its doors in midst of coronavirus epidemic.” San Francisco, CA. Hoodline.
Sawyer, Nuala (2019, April) “Trans Advocates Request $1M for Housing and Shelter Services.” San Francisco, CA. SF Weekly.
Madison, Alex. (2019, April) “Trans office wants close to $1 million for housing” San Francisco, CA. Bay Area Reporter.
Ortega-Welch, Marissa. (2017, February). “From the doctor to the DMV: Trans people rush to change IDs under Trump.” [Interview]. San Francisco, CA. KALW Radio.
Colliver, Victoria. (2016, November). “Trans patients get help from afar thanks to telemedicine.” San Francisco, CA. San Francisco Chronicle.