Deputy Coroner Anthony Schapel rejects ‘heartless’ bid by doctors to shut down RAH chemotherapy bungle inquest

SENIOR doctors at the centre of the chemotherapy underdosing bungle have failed in their last-ditch effort to shut down a Coronial inquest into the scandal, prompting cautious relief from victim Andrew Knox.

• May 2018: Chemotherapy underdosing inquest must continue: Wade
• May 2018: Chemo doc dumps bid to halt underdosing inquest
• Feb 2017: Fourth victim died during the course of the inquest
• May 2017: SA Health haematologists stood down
• Nov 2017: Inquest opens detailing how chemo bungle happened
• June 2015: How The Advertiser first broke this tragic story

SENIOR doctors at the centre of the chemotherapy underdosing bungle have failed in their last-ditch effort to shut down a Coronial inquest into the scandal.

Deputy Coroner Anthony Schapel on Friday rejected an application to abandon the inquest on the grounds that he did not have jurisdiction.

The ruling was applauded by victim Andrew Knox, who was among 10 patients given half doses of chemotherapy at the Royal Adelaide Hospital between July 2014 and January 2015.

“I believe it was an ill-conceived application in the first place, taken by a group of doctors who put themselves before their patients,” Mr Knox said.

“It put the families and the victims through an enormous amount of trauma again and I think it was quite heartless from that group of doctors.”

After more than a year of hearings, senior doctors implicated in the scandal last month argued that Mr Schapel had no jurisdiction to make findings on the deaths of cancer patients Chris McCrae, Johanna Pinxteren, Bronte Higham and Carole Bairnsfather.

Mr Knox said he believed the doctors — excluding Flinders Medical Centre Professor Bryony Kuss, who withdrew from the application — were desperate to avoid public criticism in the coroner’s findings.

“I don’t think there is any question that the doctors saw from the evidence and the rather insincere mea culpas that they delivered that it was going to go badly for them,” he said.

Mr Knox said he was confident the inquest would not be abandoned but had braced himself for the worst.

“It would have meant that it’s been two years of anguish for the families and we would have had to go back and agitate tirelessly for a Royal Commission,” he said.

Despite his relief, Mr Knox said it was still possible the doctors could launch a final challenge to the jurisdiction of the coroner in a Supreme Court appeal.

“We don’t yet know the published reasons for the decision and we may well find that the doctors follow their current course of action and appeal, which would stay the matters further,” he said.

Mr Schapel told the court he would publish his full reasons for rejecting the application later in the day.

Closing submissions were listed to begin on June 20 and are scheduled to last about four days.

The inquest has heard the patients fell victim to what a healthcare watchdog report described as “a disturbing and indefensible failure” of the medical system.

In February last year, former Health Minister Jack Snelling backed away from a similar challenge proposed by the State Government, after a letter from Mr Knox.

The former State Government also offered $100,000 compensation to victims or their families.

After the latest challenge was launched by the doctors’ lawyer Darrell Trim QC, newly-appointed Health Minister Stephen Wade requested the Crown Solicitor argue in favour of the inquest coming to its planned conclusion.