Speaker 1: I'm a Hedley Thomas, and this is my investigation into
Speaker 1: a shocking scandal in the places in which we should
Speaker 1: all feel safe, our public hospitals. Sick to Death is
Speaker 1: the true story of a senior surgeon's lies, manipulation and
Speaker 1: gross negligence, and the herculean effort it took to finally
Speaker 1: stop him.
Speaker 2: Every time I see him walk in the unit, I
Speaker 2: feel sick. What's it going to do?
Speaker 3: Now? Who's he going to kill?
Speaker 4: Now?
Speaker 3: For years, doctor Giant Vittel, the director of surgery at
Speaker 3: Bunderberg Hospital, left a trail of death and horrific injury.
Speaker 2: The first patient that he did came back brain dead.
Speaker 1: It's too awful to be true.
Speaker 3: Inside the ICU, one nurse saw it all.
Speaker 2: I think he had a god complex.
Speaker 3: Tony Hoffman tried to sound the alarm going to her
Speaker 3: superior is fourteen times.
Speaker 2: I put in that major complaint and then they awarded
Speaker 2: Patel's employee of the month.
Speaker 3: Blocked at every turn. Tony took a huge risk approaching
Speaker 3: her local MP rob messenger.
Speaker 4: So when you came to me and were scared, I
Speaker 4: could understand why, because I had an understanding of the
Speaker 4: culture of fear that dispermeated Queensland health at the time.
Speaker 3: The stories were terrifying patients operated on without proper anesthetic.
Speaker 3: In one of the most horrific cases, a patient named
Speaker 3: Des Bramage died after Patel's intervention.
Speaker 2: Patel repeatedly stabbed him in the heart to try and
Speaker 2: drain off this fluid that didn't exist, and on autopsy
Speaker 2: was found and completely abraided the left engricle.
Speaker 4: He should have been charged criminally over DES's death.
Speaker 3: With a bureaucracy failing to act, Tony and a trusted
Speaker 3: colleague called investigative journalist Hedley Thomas.
Speaker 1: Dr Patel didn't become a bad surgeon overnight. The key
Speaker 1: to trying to crack this case really lay in doing
Speaker 1: some research into Patel's history.
Speaker 3: The scandal that followed led to a Royal commission. Patel
Speaker 3: has pleaded not guilty in Brisbane Supreme Court, but it
Speaker 3: came at great personal cost for Tony.
Speaker 2: Professionally it was suicide. Personally, it's been very, very difficult.
Speaker 3: In this series, Headley looks into the police investigation of
Speaker 3: Patel and where the Queensland prosecution of the surgeon went wrong.
Speaker 3: Sick to Death premieres On November fourteen, subscribers to The
Speaker 3: Australian here new episodes first at Sick todeathpodcast dot com
Speaker 3: and The Australians App. Now for the first time, The
Speaker 3: Australian subscribers can also choose to listen to these episodes
Speaker 3: first on Apple podcasts by connecting their subscriptions. Just search
Speaker 3: sick to Death in Apple Podcasts and follow the prompts.