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Australia’s own Dr Death · The Front

• 0:03
  Speaker 1: From The Australian. Here's what's on the front. I'm Claire Harvey.
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  Speaker 1: It's Friday, November fourteen, twenty twenty five. A new political
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  Speaker 1: battleground electricity prices. That's after the Liberals joined the Nationals
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  Speaker 1: in dumping their support for the government's policy of reaching
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  Speaker 1: net zero greenhouse gas emissions by twenty fifty. It took
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  Speaker 1: a huge brawl within the Liberal Party to get here,
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  Speaker 1: and Susan Lee's leadership is still in question, but the
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  Speaker 1: opposition says they're still committed to protecting the climate and
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  Speaker 1: getting power bills down. That's been a riproaring political barney
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  Speaker 1: and you can read all about it at The Australian
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  Speaker 1: dot com dot au. A blockbuster new podcast from The
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  Speaker 1: Australian and our investigative star reporter Hedley Thomas. Sick to
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  Speaker 1: Death is the horrifying true story of a sur jhn
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  Speaker 1: who made catastrophic mistakes and went unchallenged by a broken system. Today,
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  Speaker 1: Hedley joins me to examine the case of Giant Patel,
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  Speaker 1: Australia's favorite podcaster. The Australian's own national chief correspondent, Hedley Thomas,
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  Speaker 1: is back on the air today with Sick to Death
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  Speaker 1: an exploration of one of the most remarkable stories of
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  Speaker 1: the century, how a surgeon was implicated in the death
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  Speaker 1: and serious injury of scores of patients and earned himself
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  Speaker 1: the nickname Doctor Death. Today, the Australians bringing Hedley's book
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  Speaker 1: by the same name to life with a gripping piece
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  Speaker 1: of audio storytelling.
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  Speaker 2: My name is Headley Thomas. In two thousand and five,
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  Speaker 2: my reporting exposed shocking medicae negligence at the heart of
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  Speaker 2: a major healthcare system. An overseas trained surgeon who was
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  Speaker 2: nicknamed Doctor Death by the nurses, doctors and hospital administrators
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  Speaker 2: left patients mutilated, incapacitated, even dead. Sick to Death is
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  Speaker 2: based on my book of the same name, and it's
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  Speaker 2: the true story of doctor Jan Patel's lies and manipulation
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  Speaker 2: and the herculean effort it took to finally stop him.
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  Speaker 1: Indian born American surgeon Jayant Patel was director of surgery
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  Speaker 1: at the Bunderberg Base Hospital between two thousand and three
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  Speaker 1: and two thousand and five. The reporting of Headley Thomas,
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  Speaker 1: plus the courage of whistleblowing nurse Tony Hoffman and crusading
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  Speaker 1: local MP rob Messenger brought Patel's misconduct to light. A
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  Speaker 1: commission of inquiry in November two thousand and five found
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  Speaker 1: thirteen patients died because of his negligence and many more
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  Speaker 1: suffered complications.
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  Speaker 3: United States marshals collected the doctor from a Portland prison
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  Speaker 3: on Wednesday morning.
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  Speaker 1: They took him to Los Angeles. Hotel was extradited from
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  Speaker 1: the US to Australia to face trial, and was convicted
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  Speaker 1: and jailed in Queensland in twenty ten on three counts
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  Speaker 1: of manslaughter and one of grievous bodily harm that related
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  Speaker 1: to surgeries on four patients. The convictions were quashed on
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  Speaker 1: appeal in twenty twelve after the High Court ruled he'd
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  Speaker 1: suffered a miscarriage of justice, triggering his release from prison.
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  Speaker 3: The sixty two year old was released from jail last
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  Speaker 3: Friday after the High Court found a gross miscarriage of
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  Speaker 3: justice occurred during his trial in twenty ten.
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  Speaker 4: In the trial, allegations were made not only about my
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  Speaker 4: competence as a doctor, were also going to the root
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  Speaker 4: of my character and my descency as a human being.
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  Speaker 1: After two failed retrials, one of which resulted in a
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  Speaker 1: man's lie, acquittal, Queensland prosecutors dropped all criminal medical negligence
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  Speaker 1: charges against Patel in twenty thirteen, and he pleaded guilty
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  Speaker 1: to four counts of fraud. He admitted lying to Queensland
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  Speaker 1: authorities by hiding his American disciplinary history to get the
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  Speaker 1: Bunderberg job, and was given a two year suspended prison sentence.
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  Speaker 1: He flew out of Australia the following day.
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  Speaker 4: Godam long and very difficult journey. I'm pleased that you
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  Speaker 4: sawer and I'll be going back to my life and
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  Speaker 4: my word.
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  Speaker 1: In twenty fifteen, a Queensland tribunal ordered Patel never be
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  Speaker 1: registered in a medical profession in Australia again. And now
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  Speaker 1: we've found him in Portland, Oregon, where Patel now lives.
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  Speaker 5: My name is Ellie Dudley.
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  Speaker 1: Patel was out for a walk when he was approached
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  Speaker 1: by our reporter Ellie Dudley and our videographer Quint Brewers.
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  Speaker 5: I'd really love to sit down and interview you and
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  Speaker 5: chat about the events in Bunderberg in the early two thousand.
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  Speaker 4: Yeah, completely forgot about it and I'm beyond that.
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  Speaker 5: Yeah, I would really love to sit down with you
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  Speaker 5: as he has done this history and hear about your
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  Speaker 5: what you've got to say about what happened? You've got
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  Speaker 5: nothing to say?
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  Speaker 4: No, No, I don't react to stupid criticism. So who
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  Speaker 4: I'm my life? I'm fine.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah.
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  Speaker 5: Do you think you were treated poorly or worry about it?
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  Speaker 1: Helly, what was your response to hearing that from giant
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  Speaker 1: pattel Well?
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  Speaker 2: I think he was trying to put a brave face
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  Speaker 2: on what must have been one of the most incredibly
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  Speaker 2: painful chapters in his life. A man with an oversized ego,
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  Speaker 2: very bombastic and confident, and manipulative and dishonest surgeon who
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  Speaker 2: came to Australia having lied about his background in the
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  Speaker 2: United States, having lied about the negligence and the investigations
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  Speaker 2: that led to him being very severely disciplined and barred
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  Speaker 2: from practicing the surgery that he then decided that he
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  Speaker 2: would practice in Australia in a public hospital. When he
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  Speaker 2: was welcomed with open arms, and when he said that,
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  Speaker 2: when he said he'd forgotten, well, do we ever forget
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  Speaker 2: something like that? Imagine his life was upended, the lives
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  Speaker 2: of many other people had been ended by his surgery,
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  Speaker 2: and he went to jail. He served time behind Bars,
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  Speaker 2: so I don't think he was being truthful when he
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  Speaker 2: said he'd forgotten about it.
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  Speaker 1: This story was absolutely enormous. It went around the world
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  Speaker 1: and of course devated Australians and I think it shook
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  Speaker 1: some of our faith in the health system that we
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  Speaker 1: do like to trust. But your work at the Brisbane
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  Speaker 1: Career Mail at the time started, like a lot of
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  Speaker 1: stories do, with something very simple at Google search. Tell
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  Speaker 1: me about the genesis of the story and what did
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  Speaker 1: you google?
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, well, back then, Claire was April two thousand and
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  Speaker 2: five and smartphones were something you know, I don't think
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  Speaker 2: we actually knew off if we used mobile phone, sure,
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  Speaker 2: but they didn't have the capacity for Internet and downloads
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  Speaker 2: or big data files. So I had been in Bunderberg,
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  Speaker 2: this regional city short flight from Brisbane. I'd gone up
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  Speaker 2: there to investigate the concerns of a nurse who had
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  Speaker 2: been in touch with me, Tony Hoffman. This nurse had
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  Speaker 2: told me about a surgeon that she said was dangerous,
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  Speaker 2: was killing patients.
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  Speaker 1: Headley met other nurses, including Karen Jenner, who told him,
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  Speaker 1: of course the to Bettel didn't become a bad surgeon overnight.
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  Speaker 2: I asked her, what do you mean by that? And
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  Speaker 2: she said, well, you know, he's in his fifties, he's
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  Speaker 2: been practicing surgery for a long time. He didn't become
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  Speaker 2: this bad overnight. And I said, in front of Tony
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  Speaker 2: and Karen and the other nurses who had taken a
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  Speaker 2: big risk after their shifts to come and talk to me,
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  Speaker 2: I said, so, do you mean that where he's practiced previously,
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  Speaker 2: there's probably going to be similar issues. There'll be a
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  Speaker 2: trail of problems and badly damaged patients where he's previously worked.
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  Speaker 2: And they all said, yeah, absolutely, that's right, that's what
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  Speaker 2: they'll be. And I couldn't sleep that night in this
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  Speaker 2: little budget motel in Bunderberg because I kept thinking about
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  Speaker 2: that comment and what it possibly meant. And the next
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  Speaker 2: day I flew back to Brisbane, and as I said,
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  Speaker 2: we didn't have smartphones, I had to go back to
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  Speaker 2: my desk in the newspaper building. I wanted to go
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  Speaker 2: straight home, it had been a difficult assignment, but instead
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  Speaker 2: I went to my desk to perform that online check.
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  Speaker 2: It was a Google search. I literally googled dr J.
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  Speaker 2: Patel and disciplinary history or words to that effect, and
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  Speaker 2: a PDF with the details of Dr Pateel's disciplinary record
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  Speaker 2: and the findings against him in Portland, in the United
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  Speaker 2: States and in New York State suddenly appeared and I realized,
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  Speaker 2: holy crap. And that day, well, that night, we scrambled
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  Speaker 2: to remake the front page and write a feature article
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  Speaker 2: about it with the headline why didn't they check?
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  Speaker 1: You went on to win the Gold Walkley twice, Australia's
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  Speaker 1: highest honor for journalism. You're one of the world's most
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  Speaker 1: respected investigative journos. Did that experience of googling something that
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  Speaker 1: I think as a journalist you might have thought, of
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  Speaker 1: course they would have checked that. Of course people would
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  Speaker 1: have checked. That teach you something about asking those basic
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  Speaker 1: questions that you might assume have already been answered.
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  Speaker 4: Yeah.
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  Speaker 2: Absolutely. I mean if I as a journalist two years
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  Speaker 2: after Petel's employment at Bunderberg Hospital, two years in which
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  Speaker 2: he's been the subject of internal complaints, there were even
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  Speaker 2: issues raised in the state parliament, and I'm the first
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  Speaker 2: person to discover that he's got this terrible record in
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  Speaker 2: the United States, which meant that he shouldn't have been
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  Speaker 2: employed to prepare a cut finger let alone, to sophagectamies
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  Speaker 2: and other very serious operations. It just underlines why journalism
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  Speaker 2: can make such a powerful difference. We need to come
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  Speaker 2: along and keep doing those and asking questions.
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  Speaker 1: Coming up. The whistleblower who worried Headley would think she
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  Speaker 1: was crazy.
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  Speaker 3: She became known as the Whistleblower. But for the people
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  Speaker 3: of Bundenberg and Queensland, Tony Hoffman risked everything to save
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  Speaker 3: their lives. A nurse in the local hospital, Tony stood
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  Speaker 3: alone against doctor Botel, a senior surgeon who she believed
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  Speaker 3: responsible for the deaths of patients. She fought hard to
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  Speaker 3: be heard.
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  Speaker 1: Something that's a characteristic of your journalism is forming relationships
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  Speaker 1: of deep trust and friendships really with whistleblowers and sourcers.
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  Speaker 1: In this case, it's Tony Hoffman, the nurse who you
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  Speaker 1: spoke about, who's carried a very heavy burden from being
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  Speaker 1: the person who blew the whistle on Jan Totel, You've
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  Speaker 1: done a lovely interview with Tony as part of this
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  Speaker 1: series where she talks about your first face pace meeting
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  Speaker 1: where she was very emotional. You know, she was very worried,
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  Speaker 1: she was very afraid, but she was trying to get
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  Speaker 1: you to trust her and to believe it even though
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  Speaker 1: she was very upset, she was telling the truth.
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  Speaker 6: I mean, I was frightened. I was living on adrenaline.
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  Speaker 6: I was talking really fast. I was so scared. I
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  Speaker 6: was crying all the time. So I was emotionally distraught.
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  Speaker 6: So I was presenting myself like that. So it's hard
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  Speaker 6: for people to understand that you can still be credible
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  Speaker 6: but be emotional.
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  Speaker 1: That's a really interesting dynamic, isn't it The journal who
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  Speaker 1: needs to be able to trust your sources. But often
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  Speaker 1: people who blow the whistle are, because of the trauma
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  Speaker 1: of doing that, very emotional. They seem that they might
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  Speaker 1: not be credible. Did you know from the start that
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  Speaker 1: you could trust Tony?
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  Speaker 2: I had a gut feeling that I could trust her,
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  Speaker 2: But we were wary of each other. And often that's
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  Speaker 2: the start of a relationship with your source or whistle
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  Speaker 2: blowing contact. You're really trying to work out what the
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  Speaker 2: potential weaknesses are and whether the person looks like they've
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  Speaker 2: lost their marbles because of the fact they've been trying
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  Speaker 2: to blow the whistle about something of great importance and
• 13:23
  Speaker 2: public interest for a long time and no one's listening,
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  Speaker 2: or whether they've lost their marbles and they're just making
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  Speaker 2: stuff up. With Tony Hoffman, I believed her because I
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  Speaker 2: had myself done quite a lot of reporting before meeting
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  Speaker 2: Tony about Queensland Health, and I was aware of the
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  Speaker 2: incredibly deceptive and downright dishonest conduct of senior people in
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  Speaker 2: Queensland Health in covering up big problems. I'd also done
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  Speaker 2: a lot of reporting on the challenges facing patients and
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  Speaker 2: health administrators when it came to overseas trained doctors. Australia
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  Speaker 2: had and still has a great shortage of doctors, so
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  Speaker 2: we were importing doctors from overseas. We needed them, particularly
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  Speaker 2: in areas of need, rural and regional areas, and Queensland
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  Speaker 2: needed them more than anywhere at that time, but we
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  Speaker 2: were not properly vetting the doctors. And I had done
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  Speaker 2: a series of stories back in that period, shortly before
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  Speaker 2: I broke the Betel story, and that series focused on
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  Speaker 2: how overseas trained doctors without proper credentials, who hadn't been
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  Speaker 2: checked out thoroughly and had been given jobs of responsibility,
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  Speaker 2: had caused a lot of harm and it was being
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  Speaker 2: swept under the rug. And I remember when I started
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  Speaker 2: writing those stories and asking questions to develop those stories,
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  Speaker 2: getting some raised eyebrows from people and having to sort
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  Speaker 2: of answer their questions about whether this was some kind
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  Speaker 2: of racist line and reporting where we were attacking the
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  Speaker 2: overseas trained doctors, many of whom were from countries like
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  Speaker 2: India and Pakistan and so on, because they weren't white,
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  Speaker 2: and nothing could be further from the truth. It was
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  Speaker 2: about upholding standards of care and ensuring that the Australian
• 15:27
  Speaker 2: public was protected. But what we discovered as a result
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  Speaker 2: of the inquiries that were held after the Pateel scandal
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  Speaker 2: really blew up was that in Queensland we were not
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  Speaker 2: just getting doctors from overseas who were incompetent. We were
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  Speaker 2: employing people who pretended to be doctors, one of whom
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  Speaker 2: was a Russian fellow who had no experience in psychiatry
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  Speaker 2: and had been employed as a psychiatric registrar and had
• 15:57
  Speaker 2: done a lot of damage to the patients by telling
• 15:59
  Speaker 2: them they didn't need their medication. And he got away
• 16:02
  Speaker 2: with this for a long time, and a number of
• 16:05
  Speaker 2: psychiatrists who assessed him said, oh, we thought it was
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  Speaker 2: pretty good. It'd never been to medical school.
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: We've worked together at the Australian for years now, and
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: we've made quite a few of your big investigations. We
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: always seem to do it the hard way. I think
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: that's you, that's your fault. And in this one, we've
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: brought this story to life with nearly two hundred voice actors,
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: a beautiful production led by our audio lead Jasper Leek
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: and supported by producers Kristin Amyot, Stephanie Coombs and Leott Samaglu.
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: It sounds absolutely beautiful. You and I have talked a
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: lot over the years about why audio is a great
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: way to tell big stories like these, long stories like this.
• 16:49
  Speaker 1: What do you think it is about sick to death
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: that lends itself to a listen rather than a read.
• 16:55
  Speaker 2: It's a chilling story, and there's intimacy and partnership, you know,
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  Speaker 2: for a journalist who back in two thousand and five
• 17:04
  Speaker 2: IRS thirty eight, I was probably well cynical by then,
• 17:09
  Speaker 2: but I wasn't prepared for what was uncovered in that saga.
• 17:17
  Speaker 2: We were able to lift the lid on that as
• 17:20
  Speaker 2: a result of this crisis surrounding a doctor Patel in
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  Speaker 2: a regional hospital which just then widened into a massive
• 17:32
  Speaker 2: and I think very important investigation of the entire health system,
• 17:39
  Speaker 2: and it showed what can be made possible when you
• 17:44
  Speaker 2: start with something small and the damage and the ripples
• 17:48
  Speaker 2: go out. And these lessons are still around today, Claire.
• 17:52
  Speaker 2: Some things have changed for the better, some things haven't,
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  Speaker 2: and we need to be constantly reminded of this. I
• 17:58
  Speaker 2: am in doubt that across Australia today there will be doctors,
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  Speaker 2: surgeons and people pretending to be doctors who shouldn't be there,
• 18:12
  Speaker 2: who are incompetent or fraudulent, who are just impostors, and
• 18:17
  Speaker 2: we have to be always vigilant about that.
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: Ketley Thomas is the Australian's national Chief correspondent and his
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: investigation Sick to Death is available now at Sick todeathpodcast
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: dot com, in Apple podcasts and in the Australians Mobile app.