Embattled brain surgeon Dr Charlie Teo has threatened to quit amid mounting criticism from colleagues who he claims are trying to force him out of his job.
The Sydney-based neurosurgeon hit out against the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons on Saturday, accusing the organisation of ‘persecuting’ independent doctors.
Teo, 61, has been under attack over his expensive procedures after a 12-year-old patient was forced to crowdfund $160,000 for a lifesaving surgery.
The doctor told the Sydney Morning Herald the recent backlash was the most ‘relentless and vicious’ he had experienced in his career.
‘When the distractions become too great and I can’t give my patients what they deserve, I will call it quits’, Teo said.
Embattled brain surgeon Dr Charlie Teo has threatened to quit amid mounting criticism from colleagues who he claims are trying to force him out of his job
Teo, 61, has been under attack over his expensive procedures after a 12-year-old patient Milli Lucas was forced to crowdfund $160,000 for a lifesaving surgery
‘They will eventually get me. I know that sounds a bit fatalistic but I think it is probably true. A lot of good people have gone down to the system’.
Teo attended the Health Professionals Australia Reform Association conference in Canberra this weekend where he slammed the governing medical bodies as the being the ‘greater enemy’ for allegedly employing tactics to ‘purge’ doctors.
He claimed at least six other doctors have been pushed out of their jobs, the field, and even to suicide after they were shunned by their colleagues.
He accused colleagues at Sydney Children’s Hospital of undermining him by allegedly trying to ‘control his numbers’ by forcing all his patients into the intensive care unit after surgery.
Teo, a private healthcare physician, also alleged some hospitals declined to take his patients as public after undergoing surgery.
‘Once they see blood they go for it’; Dr Teo has threatened to leave his profession after intense scrutiny from colleagues and medical establishment
After being criticised for accepting crowdfunded money, Dr Teo defended his price, blaming Australia’s ‘excessive’ private health system
The surgeon urged his colleagues to fight as a ‘united front’ against the establishment.
The world-renowned doctor has made a name for himself over the last decade by taking on inoperable cases and offering brain cancer patients a second chance at life.
Dr Teo made headlines after he performed a risky operation on a 12-year-old Amelia ‘Milli’ Lucas that could have left her with permanent weakness in one side of her body, or at worst, coma or paralysis.
Speaking after the operation last week, Teo admitted the procedure was one of the ‘more difficult’ that he’s done in his career.
Amelia ‘Milli’ Lucas went into a six-hour surgery this month in a last-ditch attempt to remove her brain tumour and prolong her life
After being criticised for accepting crowdfunded money, Dr Teo defended his price, blaming Australia’s ‘excessive’ private health system, ABC News reported.
He said he personally only gets $8,000 from each surgery.
‘The difference between [the] public and private cost of medicine needs to be discussed,’ Dr Teo said.
‘But what you have to remember is that of that $120,000 [charged for surgery] most people think it all goes to me, and that’s not the case at all.’
He said while $80,000 goes to the private hospital, the remaining $40,000 was shared between the assistant, anaesthetist, radiologist, radiographer and intensivist.