In light of the increasing number of LGBT families, the definition of the family ought to be reevaluated, Family Equality Council Executive Director Jennifer Chrisler said at an LGBT family planning panel yesterday.

Chrisler noted that over 80 percent of LGBT Americans expect to get married and have children—“a dramatic shift” from the 45 percent of lesbian women who planned to have children in the 1980s.

“Imagine a government that supported education and funding around creating and sustaining healthy families that have nothing to do with structure and everything to do with how the family spends time together,” she said at the panel, which was held at the Law School yesterday.

The four featured panelists said that though the U.S. is still far from equalizing both legal and medical considerations for LGBT families, significant progress has been made in the past 20 years.

They discussed the many different ways LGBT couples can have children, from legal adoption to medical options like surrogacy and egg or sperm donations.

“Adoption is always a challenging experience,” said panelist and new adoptive father Graham T. McMahon, an assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School. “Kids from state adoptions have a lot of medical and psychosocial needs, and a lot of private agencies are happy to take your money and never present your profile to birth moms.”

The panelists said that sperm and egg donors as well as surrogates—women who agree to carry and give birth to a baby for other parents—have made it possible for more LGBT couples to start families.

Yet finding a surrogate or donor, as well as paying for these often intricate legal and medical procedures, can add extra burdens for LGBT parents.

“If you’re serious about planning a family, you really need to start financial planning early,” said Samuel C. Pang, medical director of the Reproductive Science Center of New England. “With agency fees, legal fees, and paying for a surrogate or donor, you start tucking away early.”

Chrisler said that it is important for LGBT parents to address their sexuality with their children as early as possible.

“Anytime you pass over an opportunity to talk about why your kid has two dads or two moms, you’re asking your child to keep a secret, and secrets are bad for kids,” she said. “You need to be as out as you possibly can be before you start a family.”

The panel was organized by the LGBT groups at the Medical School and the Law School, the Kinsey 2-6ers and HLS Lambda, respectively. The event was integrated into Harvard’s first University-wide recognition of Gaypril—a month dedicated to celebrating LGBT rights and raising awareness.

—Staff writer Alice E.M. Underwood can be reached at aeunderw@fas.harvard.edu.