Dr Death butchered dozens of patients

The horrors of Dr Death: How ‘butcher’ Texas surgeon intentionally maimed dozens of patients after drug-fueled binges which left two dead and many more paralyzed

• A new podcast, Dr Death, chronicles the cruelty, crime and downfall of Dr Christopher Duntsch 
• The Texas spine surgeon’s botched surgeries left patients with far worse injuries than they came to him with, paralyzed some and killed two 
• He is serving a life sentence in jail for aggravated assault against patients 
• But his operating streak went on for two years before his license was revoked 
• The podcast examines the failures of the medical system to protect patients from criminal doctors  

Dr Christopher Duntsch drilled screws haphazardly through the back muscles of a woman. He left his best friend paralyzed and suicidal. At least two people died at his hands.  

The man who reportedly told unwitting patients he was the ‘best’ spinal surgeon in Dallas, Texas, is serving a life sentence in prison. 

And now, he is the subject of the new podcast Dr Death, which uses the jaw-dropping story of his atrocities as a vehicle to explore the first rule of the medical profession: do no harm.  

But he did enormous harm to more than 30 patients and, most troubling of all, the chilling podcast details just how difficult it is to keep even Dr Death out of the operating room – so long as he has his credentials. 

Dr Christopher Duntsch earned the nickname Dr Death after he maimed, paralyzed and injured more than 30 patients – two of whom died – in his operating rooms, as a new podcast details

Dr Duntsch, as described by the peers journalist Laura Beil interviewed, was always a guy with something to prove.

He would stay late after high school football practices, running through the drills he hadn’t gotten right over and over again.

But once he was cloaked in the white coat and had the prefix ‘Dr’ affixed to his name, Duntsch became hard to question.  

Over the span of 18 months, he performed botched surgeries on dozens of patients. Two of them did not survive.  

His patients, though, had little way of knowing who they were about to allow to open their body cavities and carve away.

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A recent survey found that 34 percent of patients rely on their own independent research to choose a health care provider. 

But other recent research has shown that Americans have limited knowledge of nutrition, something they encounter regularly. It is hard to imagine that most of us would be able to distinguish competent spinal surgeon from a negligent one.

Dr Duntsch had his medical degree as well as his PhD from the University of Tennessee Health Science Center, and arrived in Dallas with glowing recommendations from his professors and colleagues at the labs he ran.  

Patients were unaware of the accounts that Duntsch stayed out all night at drug-fueled parties before putting on his white coat and heading to work, as a friend described during his 2015 trial.

Nor were they aware of the erratic email he sent back in 2011, in which Dr Duntsch ranted that he was comparable to a god, Einstein and the antichrist all rolled into one, and even described himself as on the verge of becoming a cold blooded killer. 

Doctors and surgical nurses who saw Dr Duntsch operate were appalled at his haphazard ‘technique,’ volatility and cavalier attitude toward his patients’ well-being

So Mary Efurd saw no reason not to trust Dr Duntsch to help her get free from back pain, Beil reports. Efurd was one of the 24 percent of people who takes a friend’s advice about doctors. 

He’d made a thorough surgical plan and shared it with Efurd. It looked solid, but as Dr Robert Henderson discovered later, that wasn’t the surgery the Dr Duntsch ultimately performed.  

On the day of Efurd’s surgery, another of Dr Duntsch’s surgical patients was transferred to the ICU there at Dallas Medical Center.

Seemingly unfazed, but possibly frazzled by drugs, a surgical nurse tells Beil, Dr Duntsch went ahead with the surgery, becoming aggravated when he was told that the hospital wasn’t equipped to perform the craniotomy he wanted to use to relieve pressure on Efurd’s brain. 

He placed a screw into the muscle of her back, and left her on the table, spine and misplaced screw open and exposed, for 15 minutes.

Nothing about the surgery went well. He continued to snap at surgical nurses, X-ray tech, and seemed to simply declare the surgery over at will, Beil reports.

When she awoke after surgery, Efurd – whom Biel describes as ‘tough’ – was in excruciating pain. 

A former football player, patients were inclined to trust the young, blue eyed spine surgeon (right). But a penchant for all-night drug-fueled parties and an ego-maniacal streak soon became clear as Dr Duntsch left patients’ carnage in the wake of his surgeries (right)

Dr Robert J Henderson was eventually called in. Dr Duntsch had, until then, been the only spine surgeon at the hospital. 

When Dr Henderson began his repair surgery, he knew instantly that Efurd’s was a malpractice case. 

Screws, rods, and holes from failed attempts to attach hardware littered her spinal column. The whole procedure was done in the wrong place. 

‘Anyone with a minimal amount of training would have hesitated to go forward with the next step … or could this be an imposter,’ Dr Henderson found himself worrying.

Appalled by what he had seen, Dr Henderson helped to get Dr Duntsch’s privileges revoked at Dallas Medical Center as well as Baylor Plano Medical Center. 

But it wouldn’t be until 2013 that the state medical board stripped Dr Duntsch of his practice privileges.

Before he lost the ability to work, Dr Duntsch left a sponge in Jefferey Glidewell and damaged his esophagus. He told his best friend Jerry Summers, he would fix his football injuries, but left him paralyzed from the neck down.

Lee Passmore never walked without a limp after Duntsch operated on him. Two patients died after undergoing opertions by Dr Duntsch. 

And Beil argues that some or all of that vast array of harm might have been avoided if the first tenet of medical school – ‘do no harm’ – had a better support system after graduation.  

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