Carmody tells court of brother’s recovery

FORMER GP Paschal Carmody said a cancerous tumour and multiple lesions in the body of his brother, Peter, disappeared after he administered to him photodynamic therapy (PDT) treatment and other treatments.

At Ennis Circuit Court yesterday, Dr Carmody said Peter Carmody’s oncologist told him there was nothing more he could do for him after his response to treatment was poor.

Dr Carmody explained that his brother had an enormous tumour in the central bone in his ribcage along with multiple lesions.

He said: “Despite all attempts with radiotherapy and chemotherapy, they had failed to reduce it. Irrespective of what they did, it kept growing.”

Dr Carmody said Peter was so desperate that he told him in the mid-1990s that “I don’t mind dying” because of the pain.

Dr Carmody said that without any promise of life extension or any other type of alteration in his welfare, he administered a series of treatments to Peter to relieve the pain.

The treatments include PDT treatment and immunology.

Dr Carmody said: “For some reason or another, his response was dramatic. His pain diminished the next day and kept diminishing until it faded away completely. Better still, his tumour reduced and eventually it went away. The multiple lesions also disappeared. The joy of the story for the family was that Peter went into total remission.”

Dr Carmody said his brother lived for another 10 years before passing away from cancer in 2008.

“Cancer never goes away and Peter died within six weeks of being diagnosed with a completely different form of cancer,” he said.

In the case, Paschal Carmody, aged 63, of Ballycuggeran, Killaloe, is denying defrauding family relatives of two terminally ill cancer patients of €16,554 at the East Clinic in Killaloe in 2001-02 concerning the photodynamic therapy (PDT) treatment given to them.

Seven of the nine charges relate to 15-year-old Co Wexford teenager, Conor O’Sullivan, who died from an aggressive form of bone cancer in November 2002.

The remaining two relate to John Sheridan, 58, of Kells, Co Kilkenny, who died from liver cancer in November 2002.

Under cross-examination from counsel for the state, Denis Vaughan Buckley, Dr Carmody said he never told the O’Sullivans that he would cure Conor’s cancer or keep him alive.

“I didn’t promise the O’Sullivans a cure for Conor O’Sullivan of cancer, or that I would keep him alive,” he said.

Dr Carmody said it was his view that Conor O’Sullivan may have benefited from PDT and other treatments, as he had some success with treating sarcomas.

Dr Carmody completed his evidence yesterday.

The state and defence have completed their cases and Judge Donagh McDonagh adjourned the case to next Tuesday, April 26, for closing speeches before the jury retires to consider its verdict.