Chiropractor clampdown
Family of OAP who died after being ‘bent like a spoon’ call for tougher rules for practitioners
THE family of a retired bank manager who died after his neck was broken during treatment by a chiropractor yesterday demanded tighter controls on the profession.
A coroner also called for new guidelines to prevent similar tragedies after hearing about the case.
John Lawler, 80, died in hospital the day after being left a quadriplegic during a procedure which, an inquest heard, would have been like ‘bending a spoon back and forwards’ until it broke in two.
It was not known at the time that Mr Lawler had a bone calcifying condition, common in old age, which meant his neck ‘snapped like a rigid stick’ and his spine was irreversibly damaged.
After the hearing in York his daughter Claire said the family hoped lessons would be learned. She added: ‘We hope the publicity surrounding this event will highlight the dangers of chiropractic, especially among the elderly and those with already compromised spines.
‘ We would urge the regulator to take immediate measures to ensure the profession is properly controlled.’
The inquest was told he visited the private clinic with a leg injury after falling through a garden chair and wrongly believed practitioner Arleen Scholten, who called herself Doctor, was a medical doctor.
Mr Lawler began screaming minutes into the procedure at the clinic in York. His widow Joan, 81, said he shouted at the chiropractor: ‘You are hurting me. I can’t feel my arms.’
Mrs Lawler told the inquest that, despite her husband’s distress, the chiropractor started to apply an activator, a handheld device that stimulates the spine, to his neck.
After he failed to respond to requests to ‘turn over’, Mrs Scholten managed to move him to a chair where he was ‘slumped like a rag doll,’ the inquest heard.
Mrs Lawler said: ‘I tried to encourage him to move by saying “Push with your arms, John” but he wasn’t there.
‘He wasn’t moving and he wasn’t speaking either. He wasn’t just sitting in the chair. He was splayed all over and he was a mess.’
She ran downstairs to tell the receptionist to phone an ambulance. Mr Lawler died on August 12, 2017, the day after the session and three days after his 80th birthday.
Coroner Jonathan Heath said paramedics who later arrived were told by the chiropractor he had had a stroke. Mr Heath said that Mr Lawler probably would have survived if he had been immediately immobilised for a suspected neck fracture instead. Mr Lawler’s family argued that
Mrs Scholten, 40, acted inappropriately in tipping his head back to give him the kiss of life and moving him from the treatment table to a chair. The coroner was told her actions amounted to ‘gross negligence’.
However, Mr Heath recorded a narrative conclusion that Mr Lawler’s spine was injured while he had chiropractor adjustment and he died from respiratory depression – a breathing disorder.
He said he would contact the General Chiropractic Council about reviewing their guidelines. He wants them to consider compulsory first aid training for chiropractors and pre-treatment imaging, such as X-rays and scans, to protect vulnerable patients.
Father- of-three Mr Lawler had been recommended for physio by his GP but there was too long a waiting list. He chose to go to the clinic purely because he passed it on daily walks near home and his healthcare insurers signed off on the treatment costs. Mrs Scholten a Canadian qualified Doctor of Chiropractic, told the hearing she had never come across a similar incident in 16 years of treatment.
‘I was in a complete and utter state of shock,’ she said. ‘I have treated thousands of people and never seen anything like it.’
She was later arrested on suspicion of gross negligence manslaughter but never charged after police dropped the case a year later following consultations with experts.
A representative for Mrs Scholten expressed her ‘deepest sympathies’ to the family and added: ‘This was an extremely unusual incident, which has been thoroughly investigated. She will take on board the coroner’s findings, and has already made changes to her practice.’
‘Complete state of shock’