GMC Press Release

Prominent TM medics struck off by GMC

Finding of Serious professional misconduct.

This article was located by me in the Fall, 1991, TMEX newsletter (it's still on the WWW somewhere). I present a copy here. It appears to have been edited in parts (notice the ellipses (...)). I'd be grateful if anyone has a copy of the original press release. Meanwhile, I am attempting to persuade the GMC in London to make more information about this case available.

ENGLAND PRESS RELEASE :

The GENERAL MEDICAL COUNCIL, London, England October 25, 1991

Case concerning Dr. Roger Chalmers and Dr. Leslie Davis

The Council's Professional Conduct Committee have found these two doctors guilty of Serious Professional Misconduct in relation to the facts found proved in the charges brought against them.

The Committee directed that the names of Dr. Chalmers and Dr. Davis be erased from the Medical Register.

In announcing the decision of the committee the chairman said: ``Dr. Davis, Dr. Chalmers, The Committee has very carefully considered each of your cases separately. It is not this Committee's function in this inquiry to assess the relative merits of differing forms of treatment or approaches to medicine adopted and practised by doctors in good faith. However in light of the facts found proved against each of you in the respective charges against you the Committee has judged each of you to have been guilty of serious professional misconduct in relation to those facts and has directed the Registrar in each case to erase your name from the Register.

To each of you I say that the effect of the foregoing direction is that, unless you exercise your right of appeal, your name will be erased from the Register 28 days from today.''

Notes to Editors: The Professional Conduct Committee is the disciplinary committee of the General Medical Council. The case, which lasted 14 days, was heard by a panel of the committee made up of six doctors and two lay people.

CHALMERS, Roger Alistair: Facts found proved: ``That, being registered under the Medical Act,

1. Since about 1987...you have been engaged in providing advice and/or treatment for Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) (and) Human Immunodeficiency Virus Infection (HIV)...notwithstanding that you have insufficient knowledge, training or experience in relation to the immunology and treatment of AIDS (and) HIV...to enable you competently to engage in independent practice in relation to the treatment of those conditions;
2. You have during the aforementioned period, promoted, recommended and provided a therapy, namely Maharishi Ayur-Veda (MAV), in return for fees, for the treatment of AIDS (and) HIV...notwithstanding that:
   • (a) you have not conducted proper and approved clinical trials of MAV in the treatment of persons suffering from AIDS, HIV or ARC, in order to assess the effects of the therapy;
   • (b) there is inadequate independent scientific evidence to support the use of the therapy in such treatments;
   • (c) ...
   • (d) you have not obtained and do not possess any formal or any adequate qualification in Ayur-Vedic medicine;
3. As part of MAV treatment you prescribed three substances, known as MA608, MA609 and MA610, the nature and composition of which were unknown to you;
4. You...sanctioned or acquiesced in the publication of a number of articles in the non-medical press and other information in connection with MAV for the purpose of promoting the claimed benefits of the therapy in reversing the ageing process;
5. • (a) You caused...the publication of a document advertising a press conference on 8th February, 1989, at which you were to be one of the main speakers;
   • (b) That document:
     • (i) recommended that patients should ``stop using modern medicine'';
     • (ii) contained misleading and unjustifiable claims concerning the value of MAV in relation to the treatment of AIDS;
     • (iii) falsely claimed that the British branch of the ``World Medical Association for Perfect Health'' comprised 600 doctors;
6. • (a) When on 15th August, 1989 you were consulted by the late Mr. `A' at the Health Centre, 7 Park Crescent, London, in connection with AIDS, a condition from which Mr. `A' was suffering, you recommended and prescribed MAV treatment for him, including special dietary arrangements and medication, without prior or subsequent consultation with the doctor or doctors already treating him;
   • ...

"And that in relation to the facts alleged you have been guilty of serious professional misconduct.''

DAVIS, Leslie James Kenneth: Facts found proved: ``That, being registered under the Medical Act,

1. Since about 1987...you have been engaged in providing advice and/or treatment for Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS), Human Immunodeficiency Virus Infection (HIV) and other AIDS-related conditions (ARC), notwithstanding that you have insufficient knowledge, training or experience in relation to the immunology and treatment of AIDS, HIV and ARC to enable you competently to engage in independent practice in relation to the treatment of those conditions;
2. You have, during the aforementioned period, promoted, recommended and provided a therapy, namely Maharishi Ayur-Veda (MAV), in return for fees, for the treatment of AIDS, HIV and ARC notwithstanding that:
   • (a) you have not conducted proper and approved clinical trials of MAV in the treatment of persons suffering from AIDS, HIV or ARC, in order to assess the effects of the therapy;
   • (b) there is inadequate independent scientific evidence to support the use of the therapy in such treatments;
   • (c) ...
   • (d) you have not obtained and do not possess any formal or any adequate qualification in Ayur-Vedic medicine;
3. As part of MAV treatment you prescribed three substances, known as MA608, MA609 and MA610, the nature and composition of which were unknown to you;
4. • (a) You promoted or acquiesced in and/or participated in a seminar, originally scheduled to be held at the London Lighthouse in November, 1989, on the subject of MAV in relation to the treatment of AIDS and HIV;
   • (b) In promotional literature relating to that seminar it was claimed, inter alia, that;
     • (i) the present therapeutic approach to such treatment must be fundamentally wrong; and
     • (ii) the seminar would give ``practical advice on how the healing system can be stimulated in HIV infection through the procedures of Maharishi Ayur-Veda'';
     and it was thereby implied that MAV could offer respite to, or an improvement in the condition of, patients suffering from AIDS or HIV;
5. You...or acquiesced in the publication of a number of articles in the non-medical press and other information in connection with MAV for the purpose of promoting the claimed benefits of the therapy in reversing the ageing process;
6. • (a) You caused, sanctioned or acquiesced in the publication of a document advertising a press conference on 8th February, 1989, at which you were to be one of the main speakers;
   • (b) That document:
     • (i) recommended that patients should ``stop using modern medicine'';
     • (ii) contained misleading and unjustifiable claims concerning the value of MAV in relation to the treatment of AIDS;
     • (iii) falsely claimed that the British branch of the ``World Medical Association for Perfect Health'' comprised 600 doctors
   ;
7. • (a) On an unknown date in the latter part of 1989 you telephoned Dr. Caroline Sarah Bradbeer about Mr. A, a patient who had consulted both Dr. Bradbeer and Dr. Chalmers concerning his health problems;
   • (b) During the aforesaid telephone conversation you failed to provide Dr. Bradbeer with details of the contents of the medications that Dr. Chalmers prescribed for Mr. A, so that she could take steps to satisfy herself that the medications did not contain any substance which might be toxic to Mr. A.

And that in relation to the facts alleged you have been guilty of serious professional misconduct.'' ~

Judyology