THE DEVOTED mother of a severely disabled Manchester Multiple Sclerosis sufferer came out in support of a disgraced stem cell doctor this week.
Chris Holbrook, 45, was treated by Dr Robert Trossel in 2005 for the degenerative disease before the Dutch-trained doctor was struck off by the General Medical Council last month.
Dr Trossel of Stoke Poges, Berkshire, allegedly injected some of his desperately ill MS patients with cow stem cells that carried risks of mad cow disease in unlicensed treatments.
Mother, Ann Holbrook, has looked after her now wheelchair-bound son since MS took over his life when he was diagnosed, aged just 21.
She said: “I really do feel Dr Trossel was trying to help people, he was genuinely doing the best for his patients.
“He believed in the work he was doing and would not intentionally harm anyone. Chris believes, and so do I, that the treatment halted the progression of his MS.”
After 18 years confined to a wheelchair, Mr Holbrook can no longer speak, move or eat unaided, making his journey to Dr Trossel’s Preventief Medisch Centrum in Rotterdam an ordeal in itself.
His mother said that he endured around 10 stretcher lifts, four journeys in private ambulances and a return trip on a private plane all in the space of a day to receive the ground-breaking treatment.
She added that despite the £18,000 round trip, her son, who can only communicate through the movement of his eyes and blinking, felt a tangible difference in his MS.
The difference was so evident to her son that the strong-willed Mr Holbrook has communicated that he would gladly undergo the journey again.
The treatment featured injections of what were promised to be stem cells harvested from umbilical cords and although she received no proof as to their validity Ms Holbrook is now seeking evidence from the GMC that Dr Trossel actually used bovine cells.
“For four years after the treatment he never had a chest problem. The stem cells apparently go to weakest part of the body, which is Chris’ lungs,” she said. “He was different when he came back, he was stronger.
“I think Dr Trossel believed the cells were okay, if I thought he was using bovine cells I wouldn’t have let Chris have the treatment.”
The pair travelled to Holland with fellow MS sufferer Trevor Crabtree, from Barrowford, Lancashire, who issued a written statement in defence of Dr Trossel that was used with other testimonials at the GMC hearing last month.
“He never said that it would cure me, he had honourable intentions,” said Mr Crabtree. “I was treated in a professional manner and the treatment, while not curing me, helped me and I have no regrets in that decision.”
Stem cells are hoped to help repair nerves damaged by the disease but at present such treatments in the UK are illegal, forcing patients to look abroad at expensive alternative clinics.
It is believed that MS affects around 80,000 people in the UK.
Dr Trossel has been in the news since he was the subject of a 2006 BBC2 Newsnight investigation in which journalist Susan Watts, found that the 56-year-old had injected patients with stem cells that were only for laboratory use.
The doctor, who also had an office in London, performed the treatments on the back of a licensing agreement with a firm which later became Advanced Cell Therapeutics (ACT).
Advanced Cell Therapeutics’s South African owners are still undergoing extradition proceedings after being investigated by both the FBI and US Food and Drugs Administration (FDA) for stem cell fraud.
After the GMC’s verdict, Dr Trossel said that during his career as a doctor, he always practised with the objective of achieving the very best for his patients.
Ms Holbrook added: “When you are as disabled as Chris, 10 years is a long time to wait for treatment. We can’t sit around for a decade; he just wants to live again.
“He loves life and I would never let anybody do anything that would hurt him.”
Also published on www.mancunianmatters.co.uk
http://mancunianmatters.co.uk/content/condemned-cow-stem-cell-doctor-defended-patients-mother
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