Plus: NYC sixth-grader struck and killed by stray bullet; New Hampshire police search for person of interest in double homicide; Fyre Festival fraudster released early from prison; and manhunt continues for escaped Texas prisoner. Instead, they found him guilty of negligence and the lesser charge of causing bodily harm. In the months and years following their respective surgeries, all of them except Dmitri Onogda have passed away due to post-operative complications. Vanity Fair also later discovered that several of Paolo's other statements were false, including his claims about having been an associate professor at the University of Pisa. Ms. Sein speaking with Dr. Eric M. Genden Sr., left, who developed the pioneering procedure, and Dr. Sander S. Florman, director of Mount Sinais Transplantation Institute. Paolo Macchiarini Wife The story portrayed Macchiarini, who was already married at the time, as a serial fabulist who exaggerated or lied about degrees, academic appointments, and personal accomplishments. After Macchiarini fitted Cetir with one of his artificial windpipes in 2012, her condition worsened. Today, Ms. Sein, 56, dances and plays tag with her grandchildren and plans to resume working, possibly as an acupuncturist. His recovery put Macchiarini on the front page of the New York Times. You can see this in the speed with which his breakthroughs were accepted. China Benita packed her bags again, and began to search for Paolo in order to face him once more and their final confrontation is captured in He Lied About Everything. Unfortunately, due to complications, she passed away either around Christmas of that year or in the first few months of 2009. Hes clearly bright and has accomplishments, but he cant contain himself. Paolo proposed to her on Christmas Day in 2013. Paolo Macchiarini The Vatican confirmed that he had never been the Pope's doctor. According to the Karolinska Institutes timeline of the Macchiarini case, the institute recruited Macchiarini as a visiting professor of regenerative medicine/stem cell biology in 2010, and the associated Karolinska University Hospital gave him a part-time contract as a consultant and surgeon around the same time. AAAS is a partner of HINARI, AGORA, OARE, CHORUS, CLOCKSS, CrossRef and COUNTER. Back in New York, Benita found herself unable to stop thinking about Paolo's patients. We will send you a maximum of two emails in, We will be in touch to remind you to contribute. However, he eventually found out about his previous associations. On Friday Mr. Hurtig declined to comment on Paolos private affairs.. They and their loved ones fall victim to false hope. First Successful Trachea Transplant a Medical Milestone - The Dr. Genden also transplanted the cricoid, cartilage cuffing the trachea, supplanting Ms. Seins completely destroyed cricoid. They also questioned whether Macchiarini had obtained proper ethical permission for the surgeries and challenged a paper describing animal experiments with the technique. Those few patients who are still alive including Castillo have survived in spite of the artificial windpipes they received. Its love of human interest stories makes it sympathetic to unproven therapies. Beyenes death two and a half years after the operation, caused by the failure of his artificial airway, was a grueling ordeal. That was a very smart idea to help maintain the fragile blood supply of the airway by leaving the esophagus in place behind it, Dr. Patterson said. Change). The vice-chancellor, Anders Hamsten, resigned. The next morning, with the donor and Ms. Sein in adjacent rooms, a team of over 50 medical personnel assembled. Almost immediately after she was fitted with a synthetic trachea in August 2012, Ms. Cetirs condition began to rapidly deteriorate, according to the courts written judgment. Paolo Macchiarini But that, and the fact that he had multiple cell phones for different countries, she chalked up to his demanding job and constant international travel. Benita Alexander and Paolo Macchiarini in Venice, Italy [Investigation Discovery]. WebPaolo Macchiarini (born 22 August 1958): 2 is a Swiss-born Italian thoracic surgeon and former regenerative medicine researcher who became known for research fraud and manipulative behavior. The surgeons defense attorney, Bjrn Hurtig, said his client was considering an appeal. I didnt want the fairy tale to end., Alexander also hired a private investigator, a former Pennsylvania State Police detective named Frank Murphy. We have, for example, a growing list of scientific celebrities who have committed major stem cell fraud. But for now, lets focus solely on his medical patients, shall we? Michigan Even so, it wasnt until 2016 that the Karolinska Institute declined to renew his contract. "I started thinking that if this man is lying to me at such an egregious level, theres no way hes not doing this in his medical life," she told CrimeFeed. Benita Alexander thought that she was living a real-life fairy tale when she met her fianc, Paolo Macchiarini. She says she feels she has been given a chance of being alive one more time.. Instead of stripping the cells from donor windpipes, Macchiarini had plastic scaffolds made to order. For the respect of privacy, his wifes identity is not revealed on the internet. In his case, his stem cells were seeded into the airway just hours before it was implanted into him, making it work perfectly fine. She remained in intensive care for more than three years at Karolinska University Hospital and underwent more than 200 surgical procedures. You start to panic because you cant breathe., By early 2020, ethical approvals were in place, but the coronavirus pandemic held things up. Yet, for the vast majority of such treatments, there is little solid evidence that they work. Team Lakay As Grinnemo recalls, it nearly destroyed his career: I didnt receive any new grants. Scientific pioneer, superstar surgeon, miracle worker thats how Paolo Macchiarini was known for several years. Paolo Macchiarini - Wikipedia Each new scientific discovery brings a flood of stories about how it will revolutionise medicine one day soon. The operations were hailed at the time as a breakthrough in regenerative medicine, although some observers remained skeptical. He was handsome, suave, and a charmer. Nor did they impress the institutes ethics council when Delaere lodged a formal complaint. Ultimate Fighting Championship "Maybe it happened because I am a journalist, and once I sort of woke up and put my journalist hat back on, I could expose him," she said. Anyone can read what you share. There was another reason to be daunted too: historical assumptions that tracheas werent transplantable. Swedish television broadcast a three-part expos of Paolo's work called Experimenten, which argued that the artificial windpipes did more harm than good and were actually rotting away inside his patients' bodies. Most protagonists on medical dramas are modern-day heroes. In 2016, Claudia returned to the Hospital Clinic to have her left lung removed, and as per the last reports, she is now alive and doing relatively well. Although the difference in his birthplace, he is known to be an Italian by his nationality. Starting in 2011, Macchiarini performed three transplantations of synthetic tracheas at Karolinska University Hospital, but one of those patients died in 2012, the timeline reports. Likewise the whole idea of a wedding: Macchiarini was still married to his wife of 30 years. Some answers have emerged from the official inquiries into the Karolinska Institute and the Karolinska University hospital. Surgeon Paolo Macchiarini was hailed for turning the dream of regenerative medicine into a reality until he was exposed as a con artist and false prophet. It relieved a little bit of burden from him.. Paolo Macchiarini was amazingly accomplished, stunningly successful, and fabulously rich. Were going to show up and say, As a student, I had this idea on the back of a napkin and now were ready to go and if it fails, the patient dies and it becomes yet another example of some surgeon who thought he could solve a problem and hes created, instead, just the opposite.. Its like when you get on a rocket ship., At times, he felt in a dreamlike state, he said. He has been convicted of research-related crimes in Italy and Sweden. Emanuela Pecchia has been married to Paolo Macchiarini for over 30 years. Reports of their success always seemed like hot air to him. I have to expose him.". The first was a Vanity Fair article about his affair with Benita Alexander, an award-winning producer for NBC News. Get more great content like this delivered right to you! Macchiarinis fame had won him well-placed backers. Macchiarini had often boasted to Alexander of his famous friends. Stem cell brain implants could 'slow ageing and extend life', study shows, offering to treat just about any ailment you can name, Pregnant women's stem cells could treat osteoporosis, say scientists. Learn how your comment data is processed. Delaere feels the sentence is too light for what he considers a serious crime. The other patients were treated at hospitals in Barcelona, Florence, London, Moscow, Krasnodar, Chicago and Peoria. But it did not work, and a court in Sweden has found him criminally liable for the harm inflicted on a patient. Since this was radically new, Macchiarini and his colleagues should have tested it on animals first. Japan At the time, Macchiarini was working at Swedens Karolinska Institute, which awards the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine every year. Brave CF She considered backing out. He could see no real evidence that the windpipe scaffolds were becoming living, functioning airways in which case, they were destined to fail. "I have to tell people. Alexander eventually fell in love with the surgeon, and in 2014, he proposed to her, and they started planning a lavish wedding for the following year. But in October 2017, the attorney general's office announced that a crime could not be proven, because the patients might have died anyway. This thing came to life, Dr. Genden marveled, and we were like, Holy smokes, weve done it.. By 2011, he was working in Sweden at one of the worlds most prestigious medical universities, the Karolinska Institute, whose professors annually select the winner of the Nobel prize in physiology or medicine. In part, this is because the field of windpipe repair is a niche area. A life-saver and a game-changer. The transplants, performed on patients from the United States and other countries, were heralded as inaugurating a regenerative medicine revolution. Louisiana Woman Disappeared After Giving Somebody A Ride, 5 Things That Still Bother Us About The Unsolved Maura Murray Case, Two Texas Teens Left After Curfew In 1988 And Never Returned, What Happened To Zion Foster? Nearly all of those patients have died. Now his reputation lies in tatters. But even if his days had been numbered, this didnt necessarily justify what Macchiarini put him through. All rights reserved. But Benita stood by her man and, she said, tried to help him through a tough time. There was nothing anybody could do for these patients, said Dr. Genden, who became captivated by the problem in medical school 30 years ago after a patient with a tracheal tumor died. This guy mutilated people., Between 2011 and 2014, Macchiarini implanted artificial windpipes in at least eight patients in Sweden, the United States, and Russia. We were doing good research, but it didnt matter I thought I was going to lose my lab, my staff everything.. Ive never in my experience witnessed a fraud like this, with this level of international flair, Murphy told Vanity Fair. Minnesota His net worth has been growing significantly in 2021-2022. Apparently, her graft detached soon after, causing an infection, and because of difficulties in breathing, she had to be admitted into emergency a total of 13 times. The plastic trachea that Yesim Cetir received disfigured her and made her last three years in life basically like torture, said Bosse Lindquist, a documentarian who broke the story in Sweden about Dr. Macchiarini in a television series, The Experiment.. In 2017, after another hospital said everything possible had been tried, she felt desperate. Macchiarini shot to prominence back in 2008, when he created a new airway for Claudia Castillo, a young woman from Barcelona. In Macchiarinis case, the hope was that patients could be treated with stem cells taken from their own bone marrow. The district court in Solna today found Paolo Macchiarini not guilty on other charges, including aggravated assault, relating to three patients he treated while working for the famed Karolinska Institute (KI). It is thus likely she has since passed away. As studies have shown, the media often casts a positive light on stem cell tourism, suggesting that the treatments are effective and the risks low. US Capitol In 2017, prosecutors in Sweden charged Macchiarini with manslaughter in connection with the three patients who had received transplants at KI in 2011 and 2012, all of whom had died: Andemariam Teklesenbet Beyene, a graduate student from Eritrea with a slow-growing cancer obstructing his windpipe; Christopher Lyles, a 30-year-old American with tracheal cancer; and Yesim Cetir, a teenager from Turkey whose trachea had been accidentally damaged during a previous surgery. Disgraced Italian surgeon convicted of criminal harm to stem cell patient. Macchiarini is known for his research fraud and manipulative behavior. North Carolina This organ was prepared without the knowledge of authorities in a veterinary lab at the University of Bristol, but no one questioned it because of its initial success. Benita said that, if she can take any lessons away from what happened to her, she hopes that her experience will help others. She told CrimeFeed that, looking back, it seemed odd to her she had not met many of Paolo's close friends in Barcelona. Turn on desktop notifications for breaking stories about interest? We now know that wasnt true. He is still licensed to practice medicine in Europe. He did this by chemically stripping away the cells of a windpipe taken from a deceased donor; he then seeded the bare scaffold with stem cells taken from Castillos own bone marrow. The 18-hour procedure, conceived and led by Dr. Eric M. Genden Sr., chairman of otolaryngology-head and neck surgery at Mount Sinai Health System in New York, is a milestone because unlike kidneys, hearts and lungs the trachea has defied decades of transplantation attempts. Change), You are commenting using your Facebook account. In 2019, an Italian court said he had forged documents and abused his position, charges unrelated to his trachea work. That drama began about a decade ago when Dr. Paolo Macchiarini, working at Swedens famed Karolinska Institute, garnered headlines and accolades for replacing damaged tracheas with plastic tubes seeded with patients stem cells that he cultivated in devices called bioreactors. The pope, the palace, the world leaders, the famous tenor they were all fantasies. American Catherine Serou sent her mother a text that read, I hope Im not being abducted., Benita Found Her Dream Man But He Lied About Everything & Left Death In His Wake, Benita Alexander had no way of knowing that, by the end of her love story, her heart would be broken and many of Paolos patients who received the , Shakira Could Face 8 Years In Prison For Tax Fraud In Spain, What To Know About Reality Star Jen Shah's Wire Fraud Case, Tejano Music Queen Selena Was Shot To Death By The President Of Her Fan Club, 29-Year-Old Woman Arrested After Enrolling In New Jersey High School, American College Student In The Netherlands Stalked And Killed By Man She Met On Tinder, Iowa College Student Allegedly Faked Cancer Diagnosis, Scammed Hundreds, Italian Surgeon Accused Of Operating Inappropriately Gets Conditional Sentence, True Crime News Roundup: Elderly Man Missing For Months Found Dead In Trash Can Outside His Home, True Crime News Roundup: Prince Andrew Stripped Of Military Titles After Judge Allows Sex Abuse Case To Proceed, Student Studying Abroad In Russia Found Dead After Sending Her Mother Troubling Text, An Alabama Woman Disappeared After Her Boyfriend Dropped Her Off At Home, Have You Seen Semaj Goodwine? Texas The Macchiarini scandal claimed many of his powerful friends. Macchiarinis deceit was so outlandish, Vanity Fair sought the opinion of the Harvard professor Ronald Schouten, an expert on psychopaths, who gave this diagnosis-at-a-distance: Macchiarini is the extreme form of a con man. Benita was also growing concerned about the cost of the wedding. And then there are the surgeons on Dr. Death. Two investigations, one by the Karolinska Institute and one by Karolinska University Hospital, both found that problems with Dr. Macchiarinis work had been covered up. The grant ended in spring 2017. Kevin Belingon This was the start of a whirlwind romance that included five-star hotels, travel to far-flung locations, and extravagant shopping sprees. Likewise, they didnt undertake a proper risk assessment of the procedure, nor did Macchiarinis team seek government permits for the plastic windpipes, stem cells, and chemical growth factors they used. Benita Alexander with one of the custom-made gowns intended for her wedding [Investigation Discovery]. Macchiarini gave his regenerating windpipes to 17 or more patients worldwide. As it was built from Claudias own cells, she didnt need to be on any risky immunosuppressant drugs. Paolo Macchiarinis most notable patient is Claudia Castillo. But they found prosecutors didnt prove Macchiarini was indifferent to the injuries or suffering that the surgeries might cause, the standard required for aggravated assault. They recently published an article in the New England Journal of Medicine admitting that stem cell research has mostly failed to live up to its therapeutic promise. Andrea Bocelli was to sing at the ceremony. Georgia ONE Championship Kentucky As a subscriber, you have 10 gift articles to give each month. In other countries, more of Macchiarinis patients died after receiving one of his artificial windpipes. He hopes the immunosuppressant drugs, which can create health risks, can be reduced or even stopped if the entire graft becomes filled with Sonias cells.. And investigations by both institute and the hospital found coverups regarding Macchiarinis work. And because it was built from Castillos own cells, she didnt need to be on any risky immunosuppressant drugs. Paolo Macchiarini at a press conference in 2008. The court had to apply the intentional indifference standard for the assault charges, he says, which is difficult to prove. Yet because of the ensuing complications, she had to receive a tracheoplasty in April 2011 and another cadaveric trachea graft in 2018. Another was a Russian mother named Julia Tuulik, per BBC News. (LogOut/ In January 2016, Macchiarini received an extraordinary double dose of bad press. COPENHAGEN, Denmark (AP) Swedish prosecutors on Wednesday appealed a sentence given to an Italian surgeon who was put on trial for causing bodily harm during experimental stem-cell windpipe transplants on three patients who died. Colorado In their view, he was grossly misrepresenting his results and the health of his patients. Guided by several mentors, he delved into research and animal experiments, developing a transplant approach. As of late March, 6.5 percent of cells in the donor trachea were hers, with the proportion increasing, he said. Nevada Indonesia BRAVE Combat Federation On May 13, Alexander left her job. She received another Paolo Macchiarini biography: 13 things about Italian thoracic Records show that even with his implant failing, Andemariam was able to complete his Ph.D. before his demise in January 2013. One was a 2-year-old girl named Hannah Warren, on whom hed operated in Peoria, IL, in 2013, according to Vanity Fair. Emanuela Pecchia is married to Paolo Macchiarini for over 30 years. After being dismissed from the institute, he worked at the Kazan Federal University in Kazan, Russia. Likewise the secretary-general of the Nobel Committee. Only four months after Macchiarini operated on Claudia Castillo, his results provisional but very positive were published online by the Lancet. The Karolinska Institute declined to comment for this article, noting only that Dr. Macchiarinis sentence may be appealed. Was he conning his patients, his colleagues and the scientific community? Benita Alexander on attending Paolo Macchiarinis criminal trial in Sweden Alexander said she attended Macchiarini's trial for closure, seven years after she was But of 20 patients, including children, most ultimately died, and scientists said Dr. Macchiarini misrepresented data and exaggerated his techniques effectiveness. And after hiring a private investigator, Ms Alexander found that Dr Macchiarini, pictured, was a man of more modest means living in Barcelona and that he was still married to his wife of 30 years Ms Alexander told Vanity Fair: 'I just didn't want to put two and two together. Tennessee Her friends described him as "Mr. Big" from Sex and the City. In fact, the surgeon was still married to his wife of nearly 30 years. It is also unclear whether the verdict Thursday will have an impact in other jurisdictions where Dr. Macchiarini conducted windpipe operations. It showed department heads and colleagues that they should give Macchiarini special treatment.He could do pretty much as he pleased. His lawyer did not respond to emails from Science today. Sonia Sein, outside her Bronx home, had irreparable damage to her trachea. Thats what our experience of medical research leads us to suspect. Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in: You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. Because mucus would clog her tube, she was constantly suctioning, constantly worried about her airway, and it becomes overwhelming, Dr. Genden said, like being held down in a swimming pool. KI commissioned surgeon Bengt Gerdin, a professor emeritus at Uppsala University, to investigate the issue. One biomedical researcher has documented a total of 20 tracheal regeneration procedures by Macchiarini in Russia, Spain, Britain, and the United States, as well as Sweden. LONDON It sounded like real-life science fiction a 3-D printed organ, a groundbreaking artificial windpipe, built in a laboratory and made to order. But when Dr. Sander S. Florman, director of Mount Sinais Transplantation Institute, and LiveOnNY, a nonprofit organ donation organization, agreed to collaborate, his wife, Audrey, encouraged him. In court testimony, he defended himself as only trying to help desperately ill patients, and said he had the full support of KI and his colleagues. And difficult to jump off. In the case of Cetir, he should have known the risk of complications was higher than the expected benefit, the judges ruled. And Murphy found that Macchiarinis claims about the wedding were almost all untrue and that the surgeon was married and had been for nearly 30 years. Acquittal is therefore difficult to defend., But Gerdin says the verdict is not unexpected. From that moment on, she made a proposal to Paolo Macchiarini, and Dateline planned to publish the story. Sadly, she passed away soon after her second implant. Which left a big, burning question in the air: if Macchiarini was a pathological liar in matters of love, what about his medical research? I wasnt lying exactly, just California New York City The court heard testimony in the case between 27 April and 12 May. TikToker Says Her Celebrity Surgeon Ex Conned Her Out of $50K Every patient had another, nonlethal option, Pierre Delaere, a trachea expert at KU Leuven and an early critic of Macchiarini, said in an email to Science. ABCs true-crime documentary series The Con premieres with the story of Paolo Macchiarini, who was once considered a pioneer in the field of regenerative medicine but allegedly turned out to be just a fraud. That's when, Benita said, it hit her: She had given up a good job and spent $50,000 on a "bogus fantasy wedding" to a man who already had at least two families. New York According to The New York Times, Macchiarini is an Italian surgeon who was found criminally liable this June for causing felony bodily injury to a Turkish woman named Yesim Cetir, a patient who had received one of his 3D-printed windpipes and later died. Las Vegas It won Dr. Macchiarini international news coverage and cemented his place as a celebrity scientist. All rights reserved. But it did not work, and a court in Sweden has found him criminally liable for the harm For six years, she had endured a tube inserted in her windpipe, or trachea, to keep her alive, but her discomfort and distress were becoming more and more unbearable. The felony conviction means Macchiarini would have a hard time finding employment again in Sweden, Gerdin says. Dr. Delaere developed another innovative method, performed on nine patients so far: implanting a section of donor trachea in a patients forearm for weeks until it develops blood vessels and can replace part of the patients trachea. Cardiothoracic surgeon Matthias Corbascio, one of Macchiarinis former colleagues at KI who first raised questions about the work, describes it as terrible and insane. The court basically gave him a slap on the wrist, says Corbascio, who is now at the University of Copenhagen. Tokyo Any woman would swoon for such a catch! The court ruling Thursday was in a case involving a Turkish woman named Yesim Cetir, who was the longest surviving of his patients at Karolinska. These included Harriet Wallberg, who was the vice-chancellor of the Karolinska Institute in 2010, when Macchiarini was recruited. A 29-year old woman from New Brunswick, New Jersey, posed as a high school student and attended classes for four days before she was caught and arrested. How a star surgeon's personal and professional lives converged However, behind closed doors, Dr. Macchiarini was hiding a secret the procedures were not working. In addition to his partner of over 30 years, he also had a special next woman. (LogOut/ Called Experimenten (The Experiments), it argued convincingly that Macchiarinis artificial windpipes were not the life-saving wonders wed all been led to believe. Other witnesses contradicted that, arguing that with Andemariams slow-growing cancer, minor surgeries and other treatments could have kept him alive. The plastic trachea that Yesim Cetir received disfigured her and made her last three years in life basically like torture, Bosse Lindquist, the documentarian behind the Swedish TV series The Experiment, told the Times. Greys Anatomy Alum Isaiah Washington Retires from Acting, Tom Sizemore, Saving Private Ryan Star, Dies at 61, Chris Rock Live on Netflix, No Salvation on Last of Us, A World Without Bart Simpson, Kids Choice Awards, Rachael Ray Ending After 17 Seasons: Its Time for Me to Move On, Enver Gjokaj Returns as Captain Milius on NCIS: Hawaii, Copyright 2023 NTVB Media, Inc., All Rights Reserved, Stolen Youth: Inside the Cult at Sarah Lawrence, Luke Kirby, Ashley Madekwe & More Join Dr. Born in 1977, this Colombian living in Spain woman suffered from tuberculosis-damaged airways. At any rate, some of his most powerful friends were themselves Nobel judges until, with his fall from grace, they fell too. Death Season 2, Mandy Moore Joins Dr. Macchiarini was also charged with but acquitted of assault charges related to the deaths of two more of his artificial windpipe patients, an Eritrean man named Andemariam Beyene and an American man named Christopher Lyles, according to BBC News. Who Were Paolo Macchiarinis Victims? - The Cinemaholic In their view, Macchiarini was certainly engaged in clinical research. Her ex-husband John was dying of cancer. When Macchiarini accused one of them, Karl-Henrik Grinnemo, of stealing his work in a grant application, Hamsten found him guilty. He was one of the best con men I have ever come across.
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