Charlie Teo references infamous Oscars slap during misconduct hearing

Charlie Teo has told a medical misconduct hearing that a slap to the cheek to rouse a patient in 2019 was not in the style of the infamous Oscars moment when Will Smith slapped Chris Rock.

A visibly frustrated Dr Charlie Teo has told a medical misconduct hearing that while he did slap a patient to rouse her from a comatose state in 2019, it was not a “Will Smith type slap”.

Dr Teo repeatedly referenced the infamous Oscars moment when Will Smith slapped Chris Rock - after the daughter of a woman known as Patient B complained he had slapped her unconscious mother across the face.

Dr Teo defended his actions during a medical misconduct hearing before the Health Care Complaints Commission’s (HCCC) professional standards committee, saying a tapping motion to the cheek was his “common practice” and he would continue to do it when rousing patients from a coma.

“It is a light slap, it’s meant to be obnoxious. It’s an obnoxious stimulus. It was not a Will Smith slap,” he said.

“My only error was (doing it in front of family), usually I pull the curtains, but in this case the daughter saw.”

Neurosurgeon Charlie Teo has returned to the witness box today. Picture: Tim Hunter.

Despite three doctors earlier giving evidence that slapping a patient was “assault” - Dr Teo denied it was, saying he always treated his patients with respect.

“I care for my patients very much. I love them in many circumstances and I would never do anything that is disrespectful,” he said.

“I will continue to do it if it is in the patient’s best interest.”

The hearing is centred on two complaints of “unsatisfactory conduct” related to the care of two female patients who had aggressive, late-stage brain cancers, and recommenced on Monday after a four-week hiatus.

Patient B - a grandmother in her 60s from Victoria - did not wake from a brain surgery conducted by Dr Teo in 2019 and died shortly after.

Her husband filed a complaint with the HCCC, claiming Dr Teo “acted negligently” and removed “too much” of his wife’s brain during surgery in early 2019.

Dr Charlie Teo is under the microscope. Picture: Brenton Edwards

“When he told us he took too much (brain) out we were a bit shocked,” his complaint read.

“I never got to say goodbye. We would like to know in detail the risks and what happened... We paid $35k for my wife to die. There was no information about not coming out of this.”

Under examination on Monday, Dr Teo said he believed Patient B’s husband was “coerced” into making a complaint by staff at the hospital where she ultimately died, and said he wished the patient’s family came to him with any questions or complaints.

“Because of the good relationship we had, and the fact we had communicated several times, if he really wanted to know (what went wrong) he could have called me,” Dr Teo said.

“I felt he was told he had to complain because of where she died.

“My judgement was he was a good chap and if he had questions like that he would have asked me before escalating a complaint.”

Dr Charlie Teo arrives at the Health Care Complaints Commission Professional Standards Committee Inquiry in Sydney with his fiancee Traci Griffiths.

Dr Teo also stressed that he did make the risks of surgery clear, as he does with every patient.

“I can’t remember exact conversation, but usually what I say is that I promise to try my best and that means you have to give me licence to do what’s best for you,” he told the hearing,

“So to cover myself in that situation I say: ‘you just have to trust me and that’s the only promise I can make’.”

Dr Teo was also questioned about the surgery he performed on Patient A - a mum in her 40s who was suffering from a late stage glioblastoma - and said the complaint filed by her husband could be “easily resolved”.

“Clearly I damaged this lady because I went too far into the midbrain (when resecting her tumour),” he said.

“Whatever happened I take full responsibility - it was my hand, my technique, my doing that she didn’t wake up.

“The point is I made an error, a surgical error, I went too far and damaged this lady no one is disputing that.”

The husband of Patient A claims Dr Teo did not tell he and his wife all the risks associated with the removal of her high grade brain stem glioma in their 2018 consultation - and that the risk of “devastating outcome or death” was five percent.

She was told she had an average of six months to live, and walked into surgery “cognitively sharp” and able to walk.

However, she did not regain consciousness and was left in a vegetative state before she died a few months later.