There was a dissection of one patients esophagus, and screws that an indictment labeled far too long that caused significant blood loss in another patient. I am beginning to think the police are the only ones intellectually and physically capable of getting to the bottom of this matter, he wrote. He signed a physician services agreement on May 24, 2011, with Rimlawi and Wons Minimally Invasive Spine Institute. On July 1, 2011, Duntsch and Baylor Plano agreed to an inducement deal. Her body was in the Collin County Medical Examiners office in March 2012. They dont want to go participate in any extraneous activities, and he was totally fine going to work.. [7] He rode the desk until he couldnt, when things in the county got too busy and all the examiners were required to take calls away from the office to cover the 200-odd scene visits. There's so much news out there, headlines can slip through the cracks. He argues that the patients were just telling stories and that Passmore was fine after his operation. Meanwhile, Duntsch was struggling financially and started racking up a series of strange arrests. There is no face to the monster you are hearing about, the one destroying lives. In a long running series of complaints, a Texas doctor has been found guilty of a felony in one medical malpractice case. I have taken one selfie in my lifeon a dare. This listing includes patent applications that are pending as well as patents that have already been granted by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). Wendy has reportedly been keeping a low-profile life since ending her relationship with Duntsch and since he went to prison. Hell tell you as much. But what Duntsch hadnt counted on was the Dallas County District Attorneys Office. They turned around, away from the yelling. The 51-year-old recently starred in the USA true crime series, Dirty John, opposite Connie Britton. There are some who believe that he never wanted to be in the ORat all. Whatever Duntsch set out to be when he first donned that white coat, being a media sensation for all the wrong reasons may not have been his goal. It is during this period that Duntschs carefully built faade began showing its first cracks. Boop told Henderson that Duntsch had been sent to an impaired physician program when he refused to take a drug test after an anonymous woman called to say she had seen him use cocaine, but he had been allowed to return to finish his residency. Dr. Christopher Duntsch When he moved to Dallas in late 2010, Duntsch was 41 years old, fresh out of a residency program at the University of Tennessee Health Science Center's Department of. According to an article by WFAA, Christopher Duntsch's father Don stated his son had called him, completely beside himself, when he botched several surgeries. He hadnt seen it with his own eyes. Sproles issued a letter to Duntsch that read: There have been no summary or administrative restrictions or suspensions of Dr. Duntschs Medical Staff membership or clinical privileges during the time he has practiced at Baylor Reg. Dr. Robert Henderson, a spine surgeon who has practiced in Dallas for more than 30 years, started digging after being assigned corrective surgery on two of Duntschs patients. And of course, there are many in the medical field who go above and beyond the call of duty. Digging into Christopher Duntsch's personal and professional life, Dr. Death paints a detailed portrait of a possible sociopath. In one particularly disturbing episode, in March 2015, she said she arrived home to her front door had been locked with a deadbolt from the inside. You, my child, are the only one between me and the other side, he wrote. His mom was a teacher. Joshua Jackson stars as Dr. Christopher Duntsch, a twisted neurosurgeon who goes on a malpractice rampage in the halls of the hospitals that are inattentive and neglectful enough to employ him . After his arrest, he still had those loving parents. It wasnt until lawsuits were filed that the alleged drug use became public. Over this period, Duntschperformed back surgeries that left his patients in a worse condition,paralyzed, ordeceased. He did earnhis M.D., doing so well that he was among the 12 percent of medical school graduates in his class named to the elite Alpha Omega Alpha Medical Honor Society. And so shes here, in a Christian coffee shop tucked into a corner of the town square of Springtown, west of Fort Worth, where she lives with her new boyfriends parents. But police say an email Duntsch wrote in 2011 points to his mind-set in the months before he "intentionally, knowingly and . In April 2012, just over four months removed from that initial surgery, Passmore returned to work. Mayfield also developed syringomyeliain 2014 - fluid-filled cysts that emerged within his spinal cord, which compressednerves to cause more pain and damage to the sensitive area. Or was Duntsch just good at hiding his true self? At the time, Young was giving birth to their second boy. I look at my children, I felt like, How am I gonna explain this to them?. When Duntsch tried to reposition it, he stripped a screw; the cage wasnt going anywhere. One of the early investors in Duntsch's company Discgenics was Dr. Rand Page. He couldnt help it. Dawsons Creek heartthrob Jackson stars as the titular character of Dr Death, which ended up becoming Duntschs nickname after the accusations came out. The disc was pressing on a nerve, which caused the pain. To fellow surgeon Mark Hoyle, he said, "Everybody's doing it wrong. "You don't know this yet, but you will never walk again. Brown had a massive stroke overnight that left her in a vegetative state, and her family chose to remove life support days later. Duntsch suspected that this had something to do with his vodka bottle and neurostimulants. It said he was $1 million in debt. Its less than a millimeter from the spinal canal. And yet, the names of the latter are incorrect and misspelled. He was shocked at the CT scan: the spinal fusion hardware sat in her soft tissue. Im the only clean minimally invasive guy in the whole state. Thats according to Dr. Mark Hoyle, who was the general surgeon during Passmores surgery. Because how can I do anything I want and cross every discipline boundary like its [sic] a playground and never ever lose., Duntsch also said he was prepared to embrace the very darkest part of himself. He, too, had an injury to his left vertebral artery, and the incision was far from where it shouldve been and had begun to leak pus. In September 2014, after he and Young had separated, Duntsch was arrested for jumping the fence of Youngs sisters Garland home and attempting to take their child, Aiden. Matt Goodman is the online editorial director for. After they all partied through the night, powered by LSD and cocaine, she said she saw Duntsch put on his lab coat to make rounds the next morning. The encounter was just one of a series of troubling incidents after Duntschwho once referred to himself as a mixture of God, Einstein and the Antichristlost his medical license in December of 2013 for leaving numerouspatients either maimed, in agonizing chronic pain, or, in two cases, dead. Wendy Renee Young says she met Duntsch in 2011 at the Beauty Shopin Memphis, a bar and restaurant that borrowed its shtick from its past life as a curl-and-dye shop owned by Elvis Presleys ex-wife. Was this a way of keeping the University of Tennessee's ranking up? Duntsch allegedly performed the operation and flew out to Las Vegas without securing a call physician. Lopez answers Henderson's frustrationin a somber tone, sayingthat while you may know a doctor is bad, gathering evidence takes time. How old was Millie Bobby Brown in Stranger Things season 1? They met as Duntsch was looking for opportunities in an operating room somewhere. His next patient, Floella Brown was 63. But they were also, presumably, two consenting adults, and both were, presumably, qualified to fix the pain that was wrecking his lower body. We certainly would not knowingly allow one person to compromise the level of quality care that we have worked so hard and invested so much to achieve for our patients and our community.. The 78-year-old Denton County man was then Dr. Christopher Duntsch's first patient when the surgeon started performing spinal fusions in 2011. Dallas, Texas 75201. She says she didnt hear or see any altercation between Duntsch and Mark Hoyleher view was blocked by a microscope, and the combined hum of the EKG machine and the oxygen cylinder drowned out the sound of Hoyles pleading, if there was any. There are 31 people left alive today, irreparably damaged by Dr. Death's grievous malpractices. According to his lawyer, Duntsch was a scapegoat. Joshua Jackson as Dr. Christopher Duntsch Asked if he had a chance to meet with Duntsch, who's now serving a life sentence for maiming Mary Efurd during what should have been routine surgery,. Dallas most important news stories of the week, delivered to your inbox each Sunday. No autopsy was done (at the familys request) but it is well-documented that the stroke was due to a left vertebral artery injury due to Dr. Duntschs horrendous surgical technique, wrote surgeon Randall Kirby in a letter to the Texas Medical Board. Duntsch could have turned it into something good and meaningful. Now, one of the several complaints against the . The statute of limitations made them base their case on only six victims. Only time will tell story about Christopher Duntsch finally broke, discovered stem cells in human brain tumors, Duntsch, Ignatova, and Kukekov as the inventors, Neurosurgeon residents need to complete 1,000 surgeries, Page would see Duntsch mixing a vodka orange, At Health Grades Duntsch had 4.3 out of 5 stars, Dr. Robertson also gave Duntsch a great review, Attorney James Girards was representing Lee Passmore, one of the doctors he spoke to likened Duntsch to Hannibal Lecter, the school refused to verify or deny his claims, according to a report by the Dallas County prosecutors, According to the prosecutors, TMB had many complaints on file, irreparably damaged by Dr. Death's grievous malpractices, It took the Texas Medical Board one whole year to investigate, Henderson actually checked if Duntsch was a real doctor with The University of Tennessee, Hospitals are liable only if the plaintiff can prove that the hospital was also malicious, the same law also helps these very hospitals, For the DA though she proved to be a good witness, A string of arrests for DWI, shoplifting, and more followed, Becker's Hospital Review covered the 13 worst physicians of 2017, as named by Medscape, Dr. Death is now also going to be a TV show, Will it help patients protect their rights. Beil's somber reporting on the Wondery podcast titled Dr. Death will send chills down your spine. He kind of let himself into my apartment by climbing up my balcony, she said. Based on Wondery's viral podcast of the same name, Stan's Dr. Death follows the sinister true story of former American neurosurgeon Dr. Christopher Duntsch, who became known as 'Dr. Death' after he left a trail of maimed patients across various hospitals in Texas. We discovered it.. After this late-night party,Duntsch went to work the next morning. Because of a valuable patent the company owned, they let him through the gates and out into the world. The nerve root had been amputated. Unlike a TV series where you get to see the character,a podcast is darker. That's when he moved to Colorado to live with his parents. It was clear to anyone whos not a complete idiot that they were a thing, he says. (She says this was a misunderstanding, that she had asked him to retrieve Aiden and bring him to the hospital.) They would later have two children. That said; the 12 jurors did what the Texas Medical Board should have done. Photo: The procedure was routine and involved removing bone tissue in the spine to alleviate pressure on afflicted nerves. The shocking story of a madman with a scalpel. His mom was a teacher. 33 of his surgeries went horribly wrong. Duntsch grew up in a middle-class family. But hospital after hospital passed the buck. Henderson was brought in to operate two days later. The fault also lies with the Texas law. He recorded conversations with Foley, the head of the fellowship program, and Boop, the chairman. Like Boop, Dr. Robertson also gave Duntsch a great review. Will it help patients protect their rights? Over the course of 18-months, the nefarious ex-surgeon performed a spree of botched. And there were plenty of other signs as well. He also vibrateshis chest shakes, his right hand jitters. But as Duntsch worked, Hoyle looked over and saw blood and not much else.