All you need to know about the man looking after King Charles’s health
As the reigning monarch, King Charles’s health is vital for him to continue his duties to the crown, and as such, the job of a royal doctor is of utmost importance.
The King is readily accompanied by Dr Michael Dixon, 71, who serves as head of the royal medical household, a role established by Queen Elizabeth II in 1973. He started the position last year.
As part of the role, he has overall responsibility for the health of the sovereign and the Royal Family, attending both births and deaths, as well as managing a team of doctors at Buckingham Palace.
Mr Dixon himself has described his role previously, saying: “I have a team of doctors who cover the different royal households and also a team of specialists and am responsible really for looking after the royal family.”
He added: “I mean, clearly, there are some elderly patients on our books, so it does probably take a day or two a week.”
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Mr Dixon, though with a wealth of experience that includes practising with the NHS for over half a century, seems an unorthodox choice for the Royal Household, namely as an outspoken advocate for homoeopathy – which is a system of alternative medicines, and has even claimed that Christian healers can help the chronically ill.
In 2010, when MPs on the science and technology committee urged the NHS to stop funding homoeopathy, Mr Dixon stated: “We should not abandon those we cannot help with conventional scientific medicine.”
Interestingly, the King also has a history of advocating for alternative medicines, which may explain why Mr Dixon would be a good choice for Charles’s medical team.
The King told the World Health Organisation in 2006 that governments should “abandon their conventional mindset” about medication. Dixon has said there has been no greater champion of alternative medicines.
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Charles told a Clarence House audience in 2019: “I dread to think how long it is since I’ve known [Michael], but I have nothing but the greatest admiration for everything he has managed to do over all these years and the success he’s achieved through his constant travelling up and down from Devon in the train.”
King Charles and Michael Dixon have shared a close friendship in recent years. In 2013 Charles asked Dixon to represent him at the funeral of the founder of a cancer charity in 2013, which the-then Prince was a patron of.
Charles then made Dixon a lieutenant of the Royal Victorian Order in 2015: an award for those who give personal service to the monarchy.
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