Three months later, the Karolinska Institute ruled that while Macchiarini did not always rise to the level of its standards, he had not committed scientific misconduct. A year later, it was announced that he had been negligent in all the cases, but that a crime could not be proven because the patients might have died anyway. ", "As devastated as I was and as much as I wanted to crawl under the covers and hide and stay there, I knew I couldn't fall apart," she said. This article covers information about Emanuela Pecchia, her bio, age, husband, early life, education, and much more. Bjork said victims received "serious physical injuries and great suffering" as a result of the operations performed on them and that he "made the assessment that the three operations are therefore to be considered as aggravated assault. Paolo Macchiarini accusato di aver condotto esperimenti sui pazienti e non operazioni a scopo di ricerca. Hi, I am Tabassum, a Mass Com Graduate. He offered to marry us himself., Give me a fking break, I replied. Macchiarini and Benita quickly started planning an extravagant wedding, she said. [45][46] The Lancet, which published Macchiarini's work, also published an article defending him. He was insistent on a Catholic service, even though we were both divorcees. Benita Alexander made headlines in 2013 because of her romance with the world-renowned surgeon Dr. Paolo Macchiarini. After discovering his marriage, she broke the engagement and called off the wedding. Benita is also the mother of a 17-year-old daughter. Your email address will not be published. He did this by chemically stripping away the cells of a windpipe. Emanuela pecchia well known for being the wife of paolo macchiarini the famous italian surgeon. As per sources, when Emanuela got to know about this affair, the couple got into an ugly fight, and there was news of the couple soon taking a divorce,But, nothing such as happened till now. She said she called the castle where all the guests were supposed to be staying and asked them about the reservation, which they didn't have. "The Experiments" told the stories of some of Maccharini's patients, including young mother Julia Tuulik, who damaged her trachea in a car accident. Alexander, an award-winning documentary TV producer, met Macchiarini in 2013 while working on a story about the surgeon's pioneering work transplanting synthetic tracheas, or windpipes. The curtain has finally fallen for trachea surgeon Paolo Macchiarini at the Karolinska Institute (KI) in Stockholm. He Lied About Everything. It said he'd be in South America and that the "trip had been planned for quite some time," Alexander said. If you have been love conned, you're not alone. Of course the castle staff wouldnt tell you anything, he said. She still lives in Italy and takes care of her children there. I mean, I got this sort of chill through my body, like there was some sort of electric spark, and I remember, in my head, thinking, 'What the hell was that?'". There is no more information about her available on the Internet. In 2019, the surgeon was sentenced to 16 months in an Italian prison for faking research about how tracheas could be regenerated with patients' own stem cells. Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment. Ascolta la versione audio dell'articolo. Together, they'd spend long weekends traveling to different countries, like Mexico, Russia and Greece. She said Macchiarini had told her that for their wedding, the Vatican had offered them the pope's summer residence in the Italian town of Castel Gandolfo. Macchiarini had told her that he and his wife were separated, but that the divorce hadn't yet been finalized legally. [51][52] These concerns were echoed by KI's chairman, Lars Leijonborg, and the chairman of the Swedish Medical Association, Heidi Stensmyren, calling for an independent investigation that would also look at how the issue was dealt with by the university and hospital management. In her new documentary, He Lied About Everything (airing Wednesday on Investigation Discovery) she explains that the relationship was a con. [4][5], Previously considered a pioneer for using both biological and synthetic scaffolds seeded with patients' own stem cells as trachea transplants, Macchiarini was a Visiting Professor and Director on a temporary contract at Sweden's Karolinska Institutet (KI) from 2010. Macchiarini stato accusato di aver operato in modo inappropriato tre persone tra il 2011 e il 2014. [71] After a one-year medico-legal investigation, the attorney general's office announced in October 2017 that Macchiarini had been negligent in four of the five cases investigated due to the use of devices and procedures not supported by evidence, but that a crime could not be proven because the patients might have died under any other treatment given. She went on to say that it can truly happen to anyone. Sarah Deen Monday 23 Aug 2021 10:00 am. (Credit: ITAR-TASS Photo Agency / Alamy Stock Photo) Keep Reading Eve Herold With Whoopi Goldberg filling the narrator's seat, the series kicks off with the story of Paolo Macchiarini, a former world-renowned thoracic surgeon now known for research fraud and his strange involvement with an unsuspecting producer by the name of Benita Alexander. After she called Macchiarini, furious about what she'd read, she began to wonder what else he might have lied about. Paolo was arrested in 2012, and after this he was set free from any charges against him. Hearings are expected to begin in 2022. [13][26], In 2012, Macchiarini was arrested in Italy and charged with asking patients at AOUC for money to expedite their procedures;[36] the charges were dismissed in May 2015[37] and the prosecutor's appeal was dismissed in September 2015. Macchiarini has not yet entered a plea, but has denied all of the charges. The procedure uses the framework of a plastic tube lined with the patient's stem cells and is intended to help them replicate into a healthy version of the failing organ. In July 2012, 13-year-old Ciaran Finn-Lynch became the first child to receive a donor trachea stripped of cells and . The following papers authored by Macchiarini have been retracted: A story published by Vanity Fair on 5 January 2016 discussed Macchiarini's affair with a journalist, who had written enthusiastic articles about him. ________ #romance #tindernightmares #love #lovefail #nightmarerelationships #relationshipfail #relationships #marriage #marriagefail, A post shared by Benita Alexander (@loveconned) on Mar 27, 2019 at 9:02am PDT. Until then, there were no controversies in which he was a part of. Macchiarini had told her that he and his wife were separated, but that the divorce hadn't yet been finalized legally. Paolo proposed on Christmas Day, 2013, with a $100,000 diamond ring. Benita Alexander, a TV producer, was set to marry the doctor of her dreams in 2015 in a lavish ceremony officiated by Pope Francis. When television producer Benita covers him for a story, he'll transform her life too, but not in the ways she expects. "It was the weirdest thing," Alexander said. Taking a deep breath, I pulled my engagement ring out of my pocket and hurled it into the Hudson River. While Macchiarini admitted that the synthetic trachea did not work in the current state, he did not agree that trying it on several additional patients without further testing had been inappropriate. She came into the limelight only because of her husband and the controversies related to him. At the time, Macchiarini was employed by the prestigious Karolinska Institute in Sweden. Emanuela Pecchia is popular because she is the wife of Paolo Macchiarini. The Obamas and the Clintons would be invited to the nuptials, and it became one of the hottest events on people's social calendars though it never happened. But according to reports, Paolo cheated on his Emanuela Pecchia. [13][26] The implant failed and was replaced, and as of 2017 Onogda was still alive. He is known for his deception and manipulative behavior, but he has also been involved in controversy. On the back of his motorcycle, he drove her along the Illinois River until they found a place where she could memorialize her ex-husband. The audio series covers the accusations of ethical misconduct and manipulation in Macchiarini's medical work alongside those of his personal deceit in his affair with Alexander, told through a series of interviews with the latter. He heard about Beyene's treatment and through his doctor asked Macchiarini to do the same for him. Since April 2017, Yesim's family (or in US legalese, the Estate of Yasim Cetir) is suing the company Harvard Bioscience, which spin-off Biostage (in turn formerly known as Harvard Apparatus) produced the bioreactors and the second plastic trachea graft used by Macchiarini on Yesim. In 2011, Macchiarini immediately ascended into fame after he developed an artificial medical device that had the potential to save thousands of lives, according to The New York Times. By then, I had a new job at NBC and was very stressed. [4], On 29 September 2020, Mikael Bjork, director of Public Prosecution in Sweden indicted an unnamed surgeon on charges of aggravated assault. document.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value", ( new Date() ).getTime() ); 2021 ChandigarhFirst.com - Public Newspaper. "Going public opens you up to all the hateful trolls and naysayers who take sick joy in mocking and taking stabs at you from behind the anonymity of their computers.". [12][20][26], On 28 January, KI issued a statement saying that the documentary made claims of which it was unaware, and that it would consider re-opening the investigations. Despite having a wife and a family, Paolo had a public affair with internet celebrity Benita Alexandra. Years before he was accused of fraudulent research, the doctor was also investigated for manslaughter, as several of his patients passed away during risky surgeries. Paolo Macchiarini (22. elokuuta 1958 Basel, Sveitsi) on italialainen kirurgi, joka tuli tunnetuksi kehittmstn synteettisest henkitorvesta. He told her opera singer Andrea Bocelli would be singing in the church during their wedding and that John Legend would be playing the piano at their ceremony. In response to Gerdin's report, Macchiarini denied all the findings. [14][26][32] The effects from the first implant in 2012 prompted a second surgery in November 2013. Emily Whipp, Laura Dimon, Colleen Halpin, Emma Piscia and Anthony Rivas. New decision concerning Macchiarini's position as a researcher. [35], In August 2013 Sadiq Kanaan received a fully synthetic seeded tracheal implant from Macchiarini at Kuban State Medical University. "He and I started going to dinners and I was kind of pouring my heart out to him about all this stuff. Disgraced surgeon Paolo Macchiarini, who faked research relating to dangerous and largely discredited tracheal transplants, has been handed a 16 month prison sentence in Italy for forging documents and abuse of office. In 2015, she served as a co-executive producer on Breaking the Silence, which featured DWTS pro Cheryl Burke, and Counting On alums Jessa Seewald and Jill Duggar Dillard. The doctors also raised the issue that Macchiarini had reported on a patient in a way that suggested the patient was still alive, even though they had died before the paper was published. [11][65], In August 2016, a committee led by Kjell Asplund that had been called into being in February to investigate the three operations that Macchiarini had performed at the Karolinska University Hospital issued its report, identifying several ethical shortcomings by the hospital and Macchiarini; it also noted the pressure put on the hospital by the institute with regard to Macchiarini's hospital appointment and translational research. Shortly afterwards KI's vice chancellor, Anders Hamsten[sv], who in 2015 had cleared Macchiarini of misconduct, also resigned. I will plan everything else.. Everything we know about her is there in this article.I hope this article helped you to know more about her. I promise you, you are NOT " she continued in her caption. Similar to the one done for Castillo, on a ten-year-old Irish boy, Ciaran Finn-Lynch, at Great Ormond Street Hospital in London. But the biopsies showed the cells were dead and that there was actually fungi growing on the plastic, he said. A new two-hour "20/20" reports on Benita Alexander, a television producer who fell head over heels in love with world-renowned surgeon Paolo Macchiarini while producing a report on his revolutionary new surgery technique. Dr. Paolo Macchiarini, then a professor of Regenerative Medicine at Karolinska Institute in Stockholm (Sweden), looks on during a plenary session at the Science of the Future international scientific conference, on September 17, 2014. [15][16] Also in October, Sweden's Expert Group on Scientific Misconduct found evidence of research fraud by Macchiarini and his co-authors in six papers and called for them to be retracted. Macchiarini obliged, creating a fully synthetic trachea seeded with stem cells from Lyles and implanting it at KI in November 2011. "[72] Macchiarini was convicted of causing bodily harm, but not assault. Summary in English and Swedish", "Sweden fires board of institution handing out medicine Nobel after scandal", "Swedish Nobel judges fired in Karolinska medical scandal", "Swedes indict surgeon for stem-cell windpipe transplants", "Skandalkirurgen Macchiarini dms fr vllande till kroppsskada". 2023 NYP Holdings, Inc. All Rights Reserved, 7 ways to stop a plague before it spreads, Canadian teacher with size-Z prosthetic breasts placed on paid leave, What's next for Buster Murdaugh after dad's murder conviction, life sentence, Murdaugh son collapsed outside court after sitting stone-faced through dad's 6-week murder trial: source, Hated Tom Sandoval addresses Ariana Madix split amid cheating claims, Kelly Osbourne posts first photo of baby son as he hangs out with uncle Jack, Greys Anatomy alum Isaiah Washington retiring from acting: The haters have won, Max Scherzer's first look at the new pitch clock, Kellyanne Conway and George Conway to divorce. The Pope's spokesman said that the Pope had no "personal doctor" named Macchiarini, knew nobody of that name, and would not have officiated. Journalist Benita Alexander's life was turned upside down by her relationship with surgeon Paolo Macchiarini (Picture: Benita Alexander/PA) A woman who . "We had to clear her throat basically every four to six hours, sort of 24 hours, seven days a week," said Oscar Simonson, a cardiothoracic surgeon who worked at the Karolinska Institute and its affiliated hospital at the time. There is no divorce between the couple yet. Benita has also worked on sharing her own story with the public, and it was the subject of the 2018 documentary He Lied About Everything. But around Thanksgiving 2014, Paolo confessed that doctors at the Karolinska Institute had accused him of scientific misconduct, claiming he lied about the success of his treatment. While still trying to care for Cetir, Corbascio said his team found that Macchiarini had exaggerated the effectiveness of his surgeries and falsified data to make the surgeries seem more successful than they were. Benita traveled to Paolo's Barcelona home with two friends and a video camera. As Benita crosses professional lines to be with him, she learns how far Paolo will go to protect his secrets. He was dying and Macchiarini became someone Alexander could lean on. With the celebrations set to last four days, Alexander had her dress designer make four different gowns. Those who have been following the story of renowned physician Dr. Paolo Macchiarini may have a case of whiplash. [14][32] The graft included a cricoid cartilage, part of the voice box, which Macchiarini had not tried before. [63], The secretary of the Nobel Committee for Physiology or Medicine, Urban Lendahl, resigned in February 2016, owing to his involvement in recruiting Macchiarini to Karolinska Institutet in 2010. Alexander didn't initially believe him, but she said Macchiarini told her that the pope wanted to push forward his progressive agenda for the church. Controversial International Super Surgeon Has Vermont Connection Off Message Dr paolo macchiarini spouse emanuela pecchia and instagram bio. I confronted him the weekend of May 22, the last time I would ever see him. By the time he performed the artificial trachea transplant on Cetir, he had already performed the same procedure on four other patients. We sent out Save the Dates. Vladimir Putin was on the list, since Paolo was doing a medical trial in Russia funded by their government. On top of the devastating shock of realizing the person you loved never even existed, you feel stupid, humiliated and embarrassed," Benita wrote. Paolo Macchiarini stato celebrato sui giornali in Italia, sul New York Times, e in tutto il mondo per aver inventato il trapianto di trachea. [26] The operation occurred in June 2011 and was widely covered in the media, including a front page story in The New York Times. Paolo Macchiarini is a former surgeon who has captured the public's attention from his humble experience in Italy. Then, one morning, she read in The New York Times that Macchiarini's colleagues at the Karolinska Institute had accused him of scientific misconduct and filed a complaint with the university. She was born in Italy. In need of a lung transplant, doctors arranged to transfer her to Temple University Hospital in Philadelphia. University Hospital Careggi patient extortion, Nobel Committee for Physiology or Medicine, "RETRACTED: Development and Validation of a New Outcome Score in Subglottic Stenosis", "Experimental orthotopic transplantation of a tissue-engineered oesophagus in rats", "RETRACTED: Tracheobronchial transplantation with a stem-cell-seeded bioartificial nanocomposite: A proof-of-concept study", "Karolinska Institutet Curriculum Vitae: Paolo Macchiarini", "Karolinska orders new investigation of trachea surgeon Macchiarini", "Disgraced tracheal transplant surgeon is handed 16 month prison sentence in Italy", "Sweden: surgeon convicted of bodily harm over synthetic trachea transplant", http://www.circare.org/info/pm/CV_eng.pdf, "Tekniken skulle rdda liv sex av tta dog", "The Celebrity Surgeon Who Used Love, Money, and the Pope to Scam an NBC News Producer", "From Confines Of Russia, Controversial Stem-Cell Surgeon Tries To Weather Scandal", "Swedish prosecutor says will not charge Italian stem cell surgeon", "Tracking retractions as a window into the scientific process Swedish prosecutor won't pursue criminal case against Macchiarini", "Retraction Watch Database - Paolo Macchiarini", "The first tissue-engineered airway transplantation: 5-year follow-up results", "Doctors make new windpipe from stem cells", "Boy's windpipe replaced in pioneering stem cell operation", "Paolo Macchiarini: A surgeon's downfall", "Conference Abstract: Management of total cicatricial stenoses of a trachea by replacement of trachea produced by technologies of the regenerative medicine", "CTS 2013 Congress Abstract: 21.2 Transplantation of a Regenerative and Cadaver Trachea Novel Technology in Management of Subtotal Tracheal Stenosis: Long Term Results and Lessons Learned", "Scientists Make Progress in Tailor-Made Organs", "Christopher Lyles, Got Synthetic Trachea, Dies at 30", "First synthetic larynx part transplanted", "Macchiarini's seventh transplant patient dies", "Toddler youngest in world to get lab-made windpipe in Peoria operation", "Young Girl Given Bioengineered Windpipe Dies", "Macchiarini, procura fa ricorso: 'Fu truffa, testimonianze ignorate', "Leading Surgeon Is Accused of Misconduct in Experimental Transplant Operations", "Gerdin Report (English) Assignment ref: 2-2184/2014", "Artificial-windpipe surgeon committed misconduct", "Trachea surgeon Macchiarini acted "without due care," but is not guilty of misconduct: Karolinska", "Visiting Professor at Karolinska Institutet cleared from suspicions of scientific misconduct", "Paolo Macchiarini is not guilty of scientific misconduct", "Utredaren str fast KI:s stjrnkirurg har forskningsfuskat", "Reading about embattled trachea surgeon Paolo Macchiarini? He is considered a skilled surgeon and researcher in rehabilitation medicine. On what was supposed to be the day of her wedding, Alexander flew to Rome, where she eventually met others who'd kept their travel plans. [19], Later in 2010, Macchiarini was appointed as a visiting professor at the Karolinska Institute (KI) in Stockholm and as a part-time position as surgeon at the affiliated university hospital. .This week we are joined by Benita Alexander, the former NBC producer who's fairytale romance with the so called 'super surgeon' Dr Paolo Macchiarini turned out to be all lies, a scam.. 01:11:55. Paolo explained that the pope, who was another patient of his, wanted to use us as the poster couple to push the church out of old traditions. [47], On 13 January 2016, Gerdin criticized the vice-chancellor's dismissal of the allegations in an interview with Sveriges Television (SVT). Macchiarini had reported that after his first patient underwent the procedure, a healthy trachea was beginning to develop, Lindquist said. [19] Macchiarini was an investigator at the Institut d'Investigacions Biomdiques-Instituto de Investigaciones Biomdicas in Barcelona, Spain, from 2006 to 2009; he was affiliated with but not an employee of the University of Barcelona and was apparently an employee at the Hospital Clnic de Barcelona during this time. November 2012, retracted by the journal for copying a table from another paper without citing it: This page was last edited on 13 February 2023, at 22:39. However, while filming with Macchiarini, Alexander's ex-husband, the father of her young daughter, had been diagnosed with brain cancer. Information Index: Trachea Transplants and Paolo Macchiarini, M.D. And after hiring a private investigator, Ms Alexander found that Dr Macchiarini, pictured, was a man of more modest means living in Barcelona and that he was still married to his wife of 30 years He traveled to Illinois to operate on a Korean toddler who was born without a trachea and who was going to be the youngest person to ever receive an artificial one. Dr. Paolo Macchiarini became a star by creating a "bioartificial" windpipe. [13][26] In October 2017, the public prosecutor office announced that all criminal charges against Macchiarini have been dropped, although the medical treatment in four of five cases operated in Sweden was classified as 'negligent' the criminal responsibility cannot be proven.