Demand for professional ban on Prof. Dr. Canan Karatay: She will appear in court

Internal medicine and cardiology specialist Prof. Dr. Canan Karatay will appear in court on January 9 with a demand for a 'professional ban' due to a lawsuit filed by a former patient who has since passed away. Karatay is accused of causing her patient, Ceyhun Ülker, to lose his kidneys and suffer from a permanent disability.

Dr. Ozan Ünlü, a cardiologist at Harvard Medical School, stated that Prof. Dr. Karatay's recommendations began to harm patients and subsequently founded the 'Karatay Victims Platform.' Explaining his reasoning, Ünlü said, "Many people have reached out to me. There are also many who are hesitant. I have no personal vendetta against Karatay, nor is my goal to fight. My aim is to bring together people who have been harmed by her 'recommendations' to date, to create awareness that legal avenues are open, and to inform the rest of society in light of the painful experiences of those who followed her advice to the letter."

'STOP' ALL MEDICATIONS

According to the report by Fulya Soybaş from Hürriyet, Ceyhun Ülker passed away on November 8, 2024. According to the complaint petition and the accounts of his friend Özcan Yaman, the process unfolded as follows;

In 2014, he went to Yeditepe University due to high blood pressure issues, where an angiogram was performed. It was stated that 5 vessels were 80-95 percent blocked, and a bypass was recommended. The diagnosis was the same in other hospitals he visited to find the right physician and hospital: 'Bypass.' In 2016, he went to the private hospital where Prof. Dr. Canan Karatay, whom he recognized from TV and found increasingly convincing, worked. According to his claim, no tests or advanced imaging were performed, and his angiogram reports were not reviewed. Prof. Dr. Karatay told Ülker that he was not a heart patient but a diabetic, and that the real problem stemmed from his lifestyle, saying: 'Stop all medications.' Her prescription was 'plenty of salt.' After 4 years of applying these and similar 'natural' treatments, Ülker's kidneys failed; he survived through a transplant and developed a permanent disability. During this process, he also contracted cancer and passed away.

HE EXPLAINED WHY HE FOUNDED THE 'KARATAY VICTIMS PLATFORM'

One of the two reasons behind Dr. Ozan Ünlü founding the "Karatay Victims Platform" is precisely this: the alleged incorrectness of the treatments applied to Ülker. Dr. Ünlü stated, "Karatay says in almost every program that cholesterol medications should be stopped and that they are useless. However, one in 250 people in the world and one in 165 in Turkey suffer from familial hypercholesterolemia (FH) and have a high probability of losing their lives at an early age. In a country of 80 million, going on TV and saying 'Stop the medication!' for such a common and potentially fatal disease is equivalent to jeopardizing the lives of at least 500,000 patients or taking thousands of years off their lives. This horrified me."

THIS IS CALLED 'MALPRACTICE'

Emphasizing that many of the statements marketed as 'natural' by Karatay and some other physicians who appear on TV are not scientific, Dr. Ünlü finds it wrong for these statements to be accepted by judicial authorities as 'freedom of expression':

"There is a fine line. If the person voicing the issue is a physician, what they say can be applied as 'advice' by those listening. However, the foundation of medicine is the patient. Generalizations cannot be made. While even when giving simple advice like 'Eat fruit' or 'Exercise,' one should say 'Consult your doctor,' Karatay's liberal use of expressions like 'Do not get vaccinated' or 'Throw these medications in the trash' can create major problems, and indeed it does. Many people have reached out to me. There are also many who are hesitant. I have no personal vendetta against Karatay, nor is my goal to fight. My aim is to bring together people who have been harmed by her 'recommendations' to date, to create awareness that legal avenues are open, and to inform the rest of society in light of the painful experiences of those who followed her advice to the letter."

COMMENT ON DISCREDITING CAMPAIGN

The report noted that they reached out to Prof. Dr. Canan Karatay's communications consultant to request an interview, but were informed that they would not comment on the "Karatay Victims Platform," that this was a discrediting campaign, and that they would seek their rights through legal channels.

News Source: 12punto