Editorial: Review of GP's status justified

Te Whare Rongoa - House of Medicine

Teodora Palmieri-Chuck died trying to straighten her life out.

Exactly when she passed away may never be known.

For 15 hours she was motionless, with only visual checks from Anah van Dorp - who ran a detox facility with her GP husband Cornelius van Dorp. Mrs van Dorp had no medical training.

When Ms Palmieri-Chuck was finally subjected to a close check, she was found to be dead.

She had paid $6500 plus GST for ibogaine treatment, an unapproved but legal experimental drug used to treat her opiate drug addiction at Te Whare Rongoa - House of Medicine in Kaitaia.

Ms Palmieri-Chuck died on June 29, 2013.

Dr van Dorp told the commissioner he had treated about 54 clients with no adverse outcomes. Ms Palmieri-Chuck was administered six doses of the drug over 24 hours.

A coroner will look at whether the drug was linked to Ms Palmieri-Chuck's death.

And will also consider a report from the Health and Disability Commissioner which says that the centre's client monitoring was insufficient, and that Dr van Dorp should have acted in a "more cautionary manner". Dr van Dorp also breached the patient's rights by failing to provide adequate information about risks and side effects of ibogaine, or about the experimental nature of its use to treat drug addiction. In short, the detox facility was not safe, the report says.

Dr van Dorp does not hold a current practising medical certificate. If he reapplies for one, it is recommended that the Medical Council undertake a competence review.

Regardless of ibogaine's role in Ms Palmieri-Chuck's death, there seems to be justification for red-flagging any request Dr van Dorp makes to practise again.

Here's hoping that at the very least, the recommendation of a medical review is enacted, and that the coroner's inquest means that the uncertainty around Ms Palmieri-Chuck's final hours become clearer. Not only for the sake of her grieving family, but so that the correct penalty can be applied to Dr van Dorp.