Thomas died after a long agony. Dentist on trial

He was sent to trial yesterday by the judge of the preliminary hearing of the Court of Rome, Francesco Patronebecause he had diagnosed his patient with banal gingivitis, due to incorrect oral hygiene, instead of a melanoma.

Il dentist Roman Mark I. will now face trial on charges of manslaughter, while Thomas Newafter a long agony, on December 15, 2020 he died at the age of 44, leaving two children aged one and a half and four years old without a father.

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THE FACTS
Thomas’ way of the cross began on April 4, 2018, the day he went to the dental office in the south of Rome, complaining of discomfort due to a small swelling between his teeth. The doctor immediately makes the diagnosis: he claims that the gingival lesion is attributable to inflammation due to inadequate oral hygiene. To defeat this presumed inflammation, the dentist recommends a scheduled dental cleaning program to his patient.

So she returns on April 26 for a second treatment, then on June 18 for a third oral hygiene. On that date, given the persistence of the lesion, he was also given an x-ray with negative results. On July 30, after the swelling worsened, he underwent the fourth dental cleaning session. At that point the hygienist herself suspected that it was a tumor, so much so that she reported it in the patient’s file; even if then, at the time of the seizure of the clinical diary by the Nas carabinieri in September 2021, this note was not found.

THE EXAMS
Despite the opinion of his colleague, the accused does not see the need to carry out other diagnostic tests and invites the patient to monitor the situation “photographically”, and then return for a visit after the summer holidays. On October 1st he underwent a new x-ray, at the end of which the dentist ruled out the presence of a neoplastic lesion. Thus, in the following months, despite the progressive extension of the swelling, he continues to schedule simple oral hygiene sessions. This was until December 19th, when he decided to carry out an excision of the lesion using the laser, without however proceeding with the histological analysis of the sample and without having Nuovo sign the informed consent. Only on 18 January 2019, during the post-surgery check-up, having noted that the edema had also spread to the neighboring teeth, the dentist invited him to go to the dental clinic of the Policlinico Umberto I. Three days later he was a biopsy and the histological examination shows that he has a melanoma. At that point, a long ordeal of four surgeries, radiotherapy and immunotherapy begins. All in vain, Thomas, after great suffering and despite the total dedication of his family in assisting him in his treatment, will die on 15 December 2020.

THE INVESTIGATIONS
According to the prosecutor Vincenzo Barba, who coordinated the investigations, the doctor Marco I. caused the death of the 44-year-old Roman “through negligence, imprudence and incompetence”, “in particular – we read in the indictment – by diagnosing gingivitis due to incorrect oral hygiene (this assessment was initially plausible), in the absence of a regression of the pathology within the times indicated in the dental medical literature (approximately 15-21 days), compared to the persistent symptomatic picture”, would not have ordered cyto-histological tests, “which, if carried out promptly, would have detected the malignant nature of the pathology from which Thomas Nuovo was suffering significantly in advance, thus preventing him from surviving, compared to the date of death, for a appreciable and significant period of time”.

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