Luka Hein is suing the University of Nebraska Medical Center for giving her a double mastectomy in 2018 at the age of 16, according to a complaint filed Wednesday.
The clinic, which operates on a “gender affirming” model, allegedly misrepresented a therapist’s letter as endorsing a sex-change surgery, according to the complaint. The document alleges that doctors placed Hein on a fast track to invasive, irreversible sex change procedures due to their “tunnel vision” and that they failed to account for other factors that could be causing her dysphoria.
Hein ban exhibiting signs of gender dysphoria shortly after her parents filed for divorce. She lost her appetite and began having thoughts of suicide. Hein was also groomed by an older man online, who threatened her if she did not send him explicit pictures of herself. (RELATED: ‘Groomed And Preyed Upon’: Young Woman Was Pressured Into Mastectomy, Testosterone As A Child — Now She Regrets It)
“Traumatized by the dangerous online encounter, Luka wondered whether it would be best to have no breasts at all. She started researching matters of sexuality online and found transgender influencers who extolled the virtues of hormones and surgery,” the complaint reads. “She ordered a chest binder, transferred from an all-girls school, and changed her name. She began identifying as male and advised her mental health providers, and her parents, that she was transgender.”
Hein began meeting with an “affirming” therapist in 2017 and was diagnosed with gender identity disorder before the hour-long therapy appointment was over, according to the complaint. At 15 years old, Hein was referred for a mastectomy, as her parents were told she would kill herself if she didn’t receive the operation, the complaint alleges. The complaint also notes that Hein’s thereapist, Megan Smith-Sallans, wrote multiple times in her notes that suicide risk was “Not Evident” for Hein.
MAJOR ANNOUNCEMENT: Detransitioner Luka Hein takes legal action against the University of Nebraska Medical Center for manipulating her into a double mastectomy at age 16. She joins Chloe Cole and Layla Jane in the fight to hold radical doctors at gender clinics accountable for… pic.twitter.com/zangIbsyl2
— Center for American Liberty (@Liberty_Ctr) September 13, 2023
The lawsuit accuses doctors of misrepresenting a letter from Smith-Sallans. According to the complaint, Dr. Perry Johnson — who performed the surgery with the help of Dr. Stephan Barrientos — claimed to have a letter “attesting to the appropriateness of the operation for Luka ‘even at this young age.'” In fact, the complaint alleges, Smith-Sallans’ letter merely stated Hein’s interest in top surgery and “contained no recommendation for surgery and no statement that the planned surgery was in Luka’s best interest.”
While it’s unclear how much Hein or the health insurance provider paid for the procedure, an average elective double mastectomy in the U.S. costs $33,598, according to MDsave, a healthcare e-commerce company.
Hein’s operations stopped short of a hysterectomy when her parents refused to give their consent, the complaint notes.
When Hein told another doctor, Nahia Amoura, during a Jan. 2023 telehealth appointment, four-and-a-half years after the surgery, that she no long identified as a boy, Amoura said that it was all a part of her “gender journey.”
“Due to Defendants’ actions, Luka is now a medical orphan,” the complaint reads. “Having been subjected to irreversible surgery and a four-year cascade of testosterone, doctors simply have no idea now how to help her. Having broken her, Defendants have no idea how to fix her.”
The lawsuit names the University of Nebraska Medical Center (UNMC); Nebraska Medicine; Smith-Sallans; and Drs. Amoura, Johnson and Barrientos as defendants.
The UNMC told the Daily Caller’s that it does not comment on current litigation.
Hein is not the first detransitioner to sue the medical system. Soren Aldaco sued her medical providers in July over a botched mastectomy which left her “nipples literally peeling off of her chest.” In February, Chloe Cole sued the medical providers that gave her puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones and a double mastectomy between the ages of 13 and 17. Kayla Lovdahl and Prisha Mosley have also sued their medical providers over the sex changes they received as minors.
