Is there a reason why common binding advice isn't pulled from this study: Health impact of chest binding among transgender adults: a community-engaged, cross-sectional study? It seems to me like the most comprehensive research yet, but all online binding advice I see just repeats the "8 hours a day or less" advice but never mentions the "give yourself days off from binding" advice which was found to be more important.
I think most people probably just haven't heard of it! Although it is important to recognize that this is just one study. Still, it is good to see research being done by people who recognize the importance of binding for trans people's mental health and safety.
The full article can be read here for free. Here's the part being referenced from the Discussion section:
Binding frequency, or average days per week spent binding, was the factor most consistently associated with risk for self-reported negative health outcomes in adjusted analyses (22/28 outcomes). This suggests that taking ‘off’ days from binding could potentially reduce risk for negative health impacts. This is notable given that over half of participants bind daily and do not regularly take off days. Current community resources largely recommend reducing binding intensity (i.e., hours per day spent binding) to reduce negative physical effects (Hudson 2004; TransGuys 2014), but our data do not necessarily support this recommendation, as intensity was largely unassociated with physical health outcomes in multivariate analyses. Based on this study, individuals may consider reducing the frequency of binding, in addition to or instead of reducing the daily intensity of binding, to minimise or prevent negative physical symptoms. Binding intensity was associated with many outcomes in bivariate analyses, which may be why binding intensity is perceived to be associated with negative health impacts. However, after adjusting for other binding practices, intensity was unassociated with most outcomes in multivariate models, and was in fact negatively associated with four outcomes (numbness, lightheadedness, fatigue and weakness). This puzzling finding may indicate issues of reverse causation whereby individuals who experience negative health outcomes reduce their average binding intensity, so that lower intensities appear associated with negative outcomes. Given that many community resources recommend reducing binding intensity if negative symptoms are experienced, this explanation is plausible, but longitudinal data are needed to fully understand the relationship between binding intensity and negative physical outcomes.
They also discuss binding duration (how many years spent binding) and which types of binding had the least negative outcomes.
