This article is from page 24 of the 2011-04-05 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 24 JPG
A TRIAL involving an East Clare doctor has heard details of how an “intensive” course of treatment failed to halt the spread of a malignant tumour in a 15-year-old cancer sufferer.
It is alleged that Dr Paschal Carmody (62), of Ballycuggeran, Killaloe, defrauded the family members of two cancer patients concerning photodynamic therapy treatment at his clinic in Killaloe.
Dr Carmody has pleaded not guilty to the charges.
On Friday, Ennis Circuit Court heard expert evidence from Dr Finn Breathnach, a former consultant oncologist, who treated the late Conor O’Sullivan in 2001 up until prior to his death in November 2002.
Conor’s parents, Derek and Christina O’Sullivan, attended Dr Carmody’s clinic in Killaloe in June 2002.
The court heard that Conor had been referred to Dr Breathnach at Our Lady’s Children’s Hospital in Crumlin because of severe back pain brought about by a tumour.
A biopsy carried out in March 2001 revealed that damage had been caused to Conor’s sacrum by a highly malignant tumour, a condition known as ‘Ewing’s Sarcoma’.
Dr Breathnach said that the sacrum lies between the two halves of the pelvis and is such an important bone that it cannot be removed.
Dr Breathnach said the pain was so severe and dehabilitating that it had forced Conor to miss school and to give up playing sport. “He couldn’t concentrate because of the constant pain,” he said.
Dr Breathnach said that it was decided that Conor be treated with a course of chemotherapy as per an agreed European-wide protocol of highly detailed patient treatment guidelines.
He said that the treatment had been progressing “reasonably well” up until May when further tests showed that a residual tumour was still present.
Subsequent tests showed the tumour “had strengthened and was highly resistant”. Dr Breathnach said that it was almost as if the tumour “ignored the chemotherapy”.
The tumour then spread throughout Conor’s body and, despite what Dr Breathnach said was a heavy course of radiation therapy, it was decided to end Conor’s treatment in June 2002.
Dr Breathnach said a board of medical experts at the hospital had come to the conclusion that Conor’s tumour was “not cureable”.
Conor died, aged 15, in November 2002.
The court also heard from Rosalyn Carroll, a faculty administrator at the school of medicine at the National University of Ireland, Galway. The court was told that Ms Carroll was working at the university when Dr Carmody was a student there.
Under questioning from Counsel for the State, Stephen Coughlan BL, Ms Carroll said photodynamic therapy had “never existed” as a course in undergraduate medicine at NUIG.
Counsel for Carmody put it to Ms Carroll that Dr Carmody had been a student of a doctor with an interest in photodynamic therapy.
The trial continues.