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A doctor at a Hong Kong beauty clinic was tried on Friday for administering an experimental treatment said to be so “out of reach” that it killed a healthy mother of two in 2012.
Dr. Mak Wan-ling, who has pleaded not guilty to murder, was charged with performing “totally inappropriate” blood infusions at DR Group’s Hong Kong Mesotherapy Center in Causeway Bay without following the basic medical procedure of verifying whether they could have been contaminated by bacteria.
Prosecutors also accused the GP of failing to fully explain the associated risks and of failing to obtain proper consent before performing the injections on October 3, 2012 that led to the death of 46-year-old Chan Yuen-lam and sickened two women with “fast and relentless” adverse reactions.
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Opening the case to a nine-member jury of five women and four men, prosecutor Andrew Bruce SC argued: “This treatment was completely outside of Dr. Mak’s league, it should never have been done.”
Defendant Mak Wan-ling is accused of administering a treatment so experimental that its clinical benefits are not fully understood. Photo: Warton Li
The High Court heard that contamination was a fundamental risk of the expensive treatment, priced at HK $ 59,500 (US $ 7,612), which involved drawing blood from the client to be cultured in a laboratory for cytokine-induced killer cell proliferation (CIK). ) before being injected back into the body.
“They were told [CIK] it was good for his health, ”Bruce said. “Even if the CIK treatment had been free of contamination, the case of the prosecution is that it is very doubtful that it would be of any use to them.”
Chan, a restaurant worker, died on October 12, 2012 of multi-organ failure and septicemia as a result of mycobacterium abscessus, a bacterium later found in pipette guns and the centrifuge machine that handled her blood in the laboratory, Asia Pacific Stem. Cell science.
Another woman, teacher Wong Ching-bor, 60, required surgical amputation of both legs and four fingers of her right hand, while a third, cleaner Wong Fung-kwan, 56, suffered a permanent disability in his limbs after months in the hospital.
Mak told Wong Ching-bor that the treatment involved a research laboratory increasing the number of good cells in his blood, which would then be injected back into the body to attack the bad cells.
Mak left the Admiralty High Court in 2018. Photo: Felix Wong
Bruce said that CIK was an unproven treatment that could possibly be used by advanced cancer patients who were running out of options, but even those studying these patients cannot say whether the treatment would work.
“Experts will tell you that it should not be used in healthy people,” he said. “Even for seriously ill cancer patients, CIK treatment is not provided at all in Hong Kong; the clinical opinion in Hong Kong is that there are better alternatives.”
Hoi Tin Tong has been serving customers moldy turtle jelly since 2006, court hears.
The prosecutor also explained that the treatment would require precautions, such as hiring an accredited laboratory with competent personnel for the management of blood products, and performing the reinjection under the supervision of a hematologist or specialist oncologist in a hospital setting that allows continuous monitoring. of a patient’s condition.
But he said there were “regrettable flaws” in the way the laboratory in question prepared the blood products, and Mak did not ensure that his injections were produced by qualified people or underwent all the necessary bacteria tests to make sure that were free from contamination.
“Hopefully, the physician administering the infusion is confident that the source of the product is a suitable source, that the CIK product is properly prepared and tested,” he said. “He just wasn’t good enough to blindly and uncritically trust the lab.”
Bruce said there were also problems with the consent forms, which did not mention that CIK was still undergoing clinical trials as a treatment for cancer, and there was no scientifically proven benefit for healthy people like Chan.
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The forms should also have mentioned that the process would involve culturing blood cells in a medium exposed to the open air, adding a risk of contamination to existing ones, such as infection, hypotension and hypersensitivity.
“Doctors are supposed to inform you about the risks that a treatment can have,” he continued. “These three women and, unfortunately, Ms. Chan, were not adequately informed.”
Bruce argued that Mak, who earned a commission in addition to his regular monthly salary during his employment with DR Group, had a duty to care for his clients, but failed to fulfill that duty in Chan’s case.
Furthermore, it argued that the violation caused Chan’s death and amounted to gross negligence so gross that it justified criminal penalties.
“Any reasonably prudent person would foresee an obvious risk of death,” the prosecutor said.
His keynote address will continue on Monday before Judge Judianna Barnes.
This article A Hong Kong beauty clinic doctor tried for manslaughter for an experimental treatment that left a client dead first appeared in the South China Morning Post
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