The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines propaganda as “the spreading of ideas, information, or rumor for the purpose of helping or injuring an institution, cause, or person” and “ideas, facts, or allegations spread deliberately to further one’s cause or to damage an opposing cause, or a public action having such an effect.”
In the case of VCUG trauma, medical websites have spread blatant misinformation about this “gold standard” diagnostic test for decades with the purpose of convincing parents to allow their children to undergo VCUGs. That is unbelievably frustrating. As VCUG survivors, we’ve been to hell and back thanks to medical professionals who were legally obligated to act in our best interests, but didn’t.
There is no excuse for this, and yet, we were (and continue to be) constantly invalidated and silenced by adults and authority figures insisting that this life-altering trauma was medically necessary. That the doctors were “so compassionate toward us;” that they “did the best they could.” That this life-ruining experience—one of excruciating pain and lasting psychological trauma that all VCUG survivors have in common—is exaggerated, fabricated, or untrue altogether.
Keep reading to learn how medical organizations deceive caregivers about VCUGs in order to prioritize profits over people.
Why doctors have been lying to parents about VCUGs for decades
VCUG propaganda is horrible for many reasons. One is that there is a wealth of evidence-based research to prove that VCUG survivors are being honest about our unspeakable experiences with VCUG (obviously).
Numerous studies have confirmed that this diagnostic test—one widely promoted as risk-free, with the simple exception of radiation—is extremely distressing and results in irreparable psychological harm. This begs the question that our parents should’ve asked all those years ago:
Why isn’t this crucial information, the true risks of VCUG, listed on any medical website? Why are medical organizations staying silent about the 1994 study that proved VCUGs are psychologically equivalent to violent rape?
More importantly, why on earth is this procedure still performed on hundreds of thousands of children every year in the U.S. alone? Why aren’t we investing the funding and research that generations of traumatized toddlers deserve to establish better care, trauma-informed treatments, and alternatives for VUR testing?
Given the impressive medical advancements made in other healthcare areas in a fraction of the time that’s passed since our childhood VCUGs, there is no excuse for this. There is no reason why no reputable website, no YouTube video, no doctor’s office, mentions the truth about VCUG.
Why would healthcare providers and their staff, who are legally and morally obligated to act in their patients’ best interest, lie and manipulate families into this procedure, when a constellation of evidence shows how downright horrifying it truly is?
"In the literature, psychological trauma resulting from VCUG was considered the same as from a violent rape, especially in girls." - 2014 Study
It’s time to hold medical staff accountable for their decades-long ignorance.
Here's another question for the medical community: Why have you stayed silent about the tremendous harm you’ve inflicted (and continue to inflict every day) on pediatric patents, robbing them of the ability to develop into healthy and functional adults?
Are you truly that uninformed and ignorant about these evidence-based VCUG risks? Or are you informed and malicious?
Either way, the outcome is the same—and it’s going to stay the same until long-overdue changes are achieved.
If VCUG conductors and associated medical professionals are actually ignorant, this means that they are genuinely unaware of the true risks of VCUGs—and they certainly shouldn’t be performing this so-called “procedure” in the first place, as healthcare providers are expected to possess a sufficient understanding of all risks involved with any treatment or procedure before performing it on any human person, let alone a procedure as distressing, dangerous, and sexually invasive as voiding cystourethrogram…even if those risks are perceived as minor or damaging to medical organizations’ profits.
There is no excuse. It’s 2023. Accessing and displaying factual information on the internet isn’t a novelty; in fact, it’s easier and more convenient than ever before.
If medical staff is malicious, then it’s time to strip them of their licenses prevent the same harm from befalling other children. Why are we permitting medical professionals to ruin the lives of hundreds of thousands of kids?
In either scenario, the bottom line is this: Medical professionals are in the wrong, and their negligence has traumatized generations of children and their families. In many cases, the child’s growth and development are stunted; their relationships with friends and family members are impaired or destroyed; their ability to seek relational healing is cut off; their willingness to seek medical care for the countless health issues they will indubitably experience well into adulthood is thwarted.
We’re dooming children to miserable lives, all because medical organizations in the U.S. and beyond are unwilling to put people—children—before profit.
Why? Why continue this barbaric procedure when we’ve known the real risks since the 1990s? If a 21-year-old college student with a shitty laptop can uncover this horrifying secret that the medical community has successfully buried (with minimal effort, honestly) for decades, then there is absolutely no excuse for staff to pretend that they "don't know” better.
There’s no reason why medical professionals should be allowed to feign ignorance any longer. They’ve had decades to educate themselves on the true harms of VCUGs. Enough is enough.
Every internet source that profits in the healthcare industry promotes this procedure as entirely harmless. If that’s true, what happened to all of us? Did we all have group psychosis in different hospitals at different times without even knowing each other? Seems unlikely.
I’m tired of staying silent while medical organizations continue to choose profit over tiny, vulnerable humans dependent on the adults around them for survival and guidance.
I’m tired of holding onto this when it feels like the world doesn't know about facts that have been publicly accessible since the 1990s.
Parents and VCUG survivors alike deserve to know the truth about VCUGs, even if just to validate their pain, experiences, and lifelong mental health struggles, and I don't care how much that pisses off the medical community; it’s the least we deserve after decades of lies, misinformation, and VCUG propaganda resulting in severe, long-term harm for kids…not to mention secondary trauma for families and loved ones.
Join VCUG Survivors in Living #Unsilenced
The Unsilenced Movement is committed to raising awareness about the long-term risks of voiding cystourethrogram. Join us in advocating for VCUG reform in pediatric urology and prevent more children from reaping life-altering harm.
They mistook me for someone who hadn't done the research. Tried telling me "children only cry because they don't like being held down". I was wild, knowing this to be patently untrue, and refused consent. Not long after this I met a Mum who trusted in the information she was given and consented for her daughter. Both of them were traumatised. The daugher was receiving psychotherapy for severe PTSD.