Harvard-educated doctor who‘ll help decide his fate

DR MICHIO Hirano – Charlie’s last hope – is one of the world’s top researchers in mitochondrial diseases and has spent 30 years working in neurology.

The Harvard-educated doctor is an expert on the nucleoside treatment he says could help the little boy.

Friends said he is known for winning the trust of patients through his caring nature and professionalism.

The 56-year-old, whose father was an acclaimed neuroscientist, is a senior clinician at the Columbia University Medical Centre in New York.

Dr Kei Doi, who went to the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York with Dr Hirano, said he ‘really will do what he feels is best for the patient’.

He said: ‘He’s a very caring individual and really goes out of his way to help people. He’s very well-respected.

‘I trust him wholeheartedly with any medical questions.’

Twice-married Dr Hirano has treated others with conditions similar to Charlie’s. His second wife, with whom he has two young daughters, is also a neurologist at Columbia.

Dr Doi said Dr Hirano went to Cuba in the 1990s and met Fidel Castro after finding a vitamin absence that caused 26,000 Cubans to go partially blind.

Outside work, Dr Hirano is ‘shy’ and likes listening to classical music, he added. Dr Hirano graduated magna cum laude from Harvard University and received his medical degree from Albert Einstein College.

He trained in neurology at Columbia University Medical Centre.

His father Asao, 90, used to be a professor of pathology and neuroscience at Albert Einstein and was head of neuropathology at a hospital in The Bronx.

In 1965 Asao Hirano became the first person to observe proteins in neurons that were named ‘Hirano bodies’.

Dr Hirano’s mother Keiko, 4, taught Japanese at a high school.

One person who knows Dr Hirano well said: ‘Little Charlie is in very good hands. I couldn’t think of a finer person of physician for neurological issues.

‘He truly is an exceptionally compassionate, noble human being.’