After the death of the patient Well, indictment against health practitioners

After the death of people: prosecutor's office charges against naturopaths

After the death of several patients of a practice in Brüggen-Bracht in 2016, the prosecutor Krefeld has now filed charges against the accused for allegations of negligent violation of the Medicines Act in four cases and with the charge of negligent homicide in three cases.

The public prosecutor's office accuses the defendant of having produced overdosed infusion solutions containing 3-bromopyruvate (3-BP) on July 27, 2016 in his practice in Brüggen. He then administered four patients intravenously and significantly reduced the quality of the drugs, leaving three of them dead in the ensuing period.

According to the results of the investigation, the accused used a scale unsuitable for this purpose for the preparation of infusion solutions. In addition, he had provided or created no control mechanisms to check the weighed by him, on the body weight and the constitution of the patient individually tailored dosage of the active ingredient 3-bromopyruvate. For this purpose, however, he would have been obliged to pay due attention to the fact that it was an individual dose and a substance which had to be carefully dosed according to the knowledge known to him.

As a result of these errors, a significant overdose of the drug 3-bromopyruvate occurred in the preparation of infusion solutions for the four injured patients by 3.11-6.15 times the patient-specific planned dose, causing death of the three deceased patients has been.

The preparation and the administration of the not further investigated or even concluding researched active substance 3-BP were not forbidden to the accused in the context of its activity as a non-medical practitioner. However, even a slight overdose can lead to significant and potentially lethal side effects.

According to the local medical findings, the substance breaks through the blood-brain barrier at doses over 4.5 times the therapeutically possibly effective amount and acts directly in the human brain. 3-Bromopyruvate attacks cell metabolism and respiration, causing brain cells to die. These mechanisms of action and the resulting organic consequences have been shown to kill the three patients. On the other hand, the alternative practitioner is not responsible for the death of other patients. (sb, pm)