BONITA SPRINGS A state judge has recommended Bonita Springs cardiologist Zannos Grekos lose his medical license, saying he committed medical malpractice when he performed an unproven stem cell treatment on a patient that had no chance of success, records showed Monday.

In issuing a 25-page recommended order Monday that now goes to the state Board of Medicine, administrative law judge J. Lawrence Johnston said the case finding supports the imposition of a penalty at the top of the ranges, namely revocation and a $20,000 fine.

The case involves Grekos unorthodox stem-cell therapy in 2010 on 69-year-old Domenica Fitzgerald, who suffered a stroke and was taken off life support. She died April 4, 2010.

She had gone to Grekos for what she believed was going to be a stem cell treatment using her own stem cells to repair tingling in her legs that was a side-effect from chemotherapy for breast cancer treatment several years earlier.

Grekos had developed a following in Southwest Florida when he arranged for people to have their cultivated stem cells injected into their body at the site of damaged heart or lung tissue.

He would extract a sample of their blood and send it to a laboratory in Israel for spinning to cultivate the stem cells. From there, the blood would be sent to the Dominican Republic. Several patients who benefited from this treatment stand by Grekos and attended the hearing last fall in Naples.

But with Fitzgerald, Grekos treated her in his own Bonita Springs practice and when he aspirated bone marrow from her, it wasnt processed. He instead injected unconcentrated and grossly filtered bone marrow aspirate into her carotid artery.

The judge said what Grekos did had virtually no hope of success and had a very high probability that it would cause the patient to have a serious stroke.

He said Grekos should have known his treatment carried grave risks.

Instead he denies the gravity of the risk, the judge said. He (stated) that he did not know what would happen as a result of this procedure.

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State judge: Bonita stem cell doctor Grekos should lose medical license