Chua Jui Meng and Anwar's spine
Corona GlandisPublished: Feb 16, 2001 12:32 AM | Updated: Jan 29, 2008 10:21 AM
Politician cum lawyer, Chua Jui Meng, I trust in his capacity as Health Minister, went to great length, as reported in yesterday's dailies, to highlight the magnanimity of the government in conceding to Anwar Ibrahim's request to have a foreign medical specialist manage his spinal problem.
Drawing on his immense experience on spinal surgery from his years as parliamentary secretary of health, and subsequently Health Minister, he felt qualified to pass comment on the 'little known field of microinvasive spinal surgery' that the former deputy prime minister requested.
Never mind the fact that a recent Spinal Conference held locally saw an almost political statement made by a distinguished orthopaedic professor from California (whose attendance at the symposium was sponsored). The eminent man deliberately specified that patients from Malaysia did not need to recruit the expertise of spinal experts abroad, owing to the abundance of local experts. One could almost be forgiven for assuming a veiled reference to one particular patient. Strange that no such forthright statement came from the team of doctors directly involved in his care.
The fact that Chua opted to have his bypass surgery at the National Heart Institute (IJN) is a moot point. Of course, he should ... the IJN is a corporatised medical centre dedicated purely to cardiac surgery, with state of the art facilities. There is no comparison to KL Hospital, where Anwar is being treated. If there was a dedicated, corporatised spinal centre, with state-of-the-art facilities including microinvasive spinal surgical expertise anywhere in this country, I am certain that Anwar would, with the same confidence as Chua, place himself under their care. The fact is that there isn't.
Furthermore, it doesn't take a lot of lawyering expertise to figure out that one does not sign a blanket declaration of responsibility for everything and asunder in any situation. There's only so much that a surgeon can be responsible for. Acts of omission or commission by different team members and paramedical staff which may endanger the life or well-being of an individual certainly would not be signed away by any reasonably sane person. After all, let's not forget the infamous assault under tight security at Bukit Aman... and that was claimed initially to be self-inflicted!
Drawing on his immense experience on spinal surgery from his years as parliamentary secretary of health, and subsequently Health Minister, he felt qualified to pass comment on the 'little known field of microinvasive spinal surgery' that the former deputy prime minister requested.
Never mind the fact that a recent Spinal Conference held locally saw an almost political statement made by a distinguished orthopaedic professor from California (whose attendance at the symposium was sponsored). The eminent man deliberately specified that patients from Malaysia did not need to recruit the expertise of spinal experts abroad, owing to the abundance of local experts. One could almost be forgiven for assuming a veiled reference to one particular patient. Strange that no such forthright statement came from the team of doctors directly involved in his care.
The fact that Chua opted to have his bypass surgery at the National Heart Institute (IJN) is a moot point. Of course, he should ... the IJN is a corporatised medical centre dedicated purely to cardiac surgery, with state of the art facilities. There is no comparison to KL Hospital, where Anwar is being treated. If there was a dedicated, corporatised spinal centre, with state-of-the-art facilities including microinvasive spinal surgical expertise anywhere in this country, I am certain that Anwar would, with the same confidence as Chua, place himself under their care. The fact is that there isn't.
Furthermore, it doesn't take a lot of lawyering expertise to figure out that one does not sign a blanket declaration of responsibility for everything and asunder in any situation. There's only so much that a surgeon can be responsible for. Acts of omission or commission by different team members and paramedical staff which may endanger the life or well-being of an individual certainly would not be signed away by any reasonably sane person. After all, let's not forget the infamous assault under tight security at Bukit Aman... and that was claimed initially to be self-inflicted!
View Comments0