At least four medical malpractice lawsuits have been filed in recent years alleging that hospital patients died from overdoses of Diprivan –- the powerful sedative found in Michael Jackson's home after his death.

One patient, Chester Forrester, allegedly went into “respiratory and/or cardiac arrest” only four minutes after a physician at a Norfolk, Va., hospital began administering Diprivan to him as an anesthetic. The 57-year-old resident of Kitty Hawk, N.C., had been admitted Sept. 8, 2005 to Bon Secours DePaul Medical Center for laser eye surgery.

“Based upon the manufacturer's calculations for Diprivan dosage levels, the amount of the anesthesia administered exceeded the recommended level by approximately twenty-five percent,” his widow said in a complaint filed in September 2007.

A Florida case involving Diprivan is currently set for trial next month. John Glatzel, 60, died of a heart attack in January 2004 after allegedly receiving an overdose of the drug at St. Anthony's Hospital in St. Petersburg, Fla.

With the results of toxicology tests still pending, there is as yet no evidence that Diprivan -– the brand name for propofol -- was in Jackson's system when he suffered his fatal heart attack June 25. But the Los Angeles Times has quoted a source as saying that “numerous bottles” of Diprivan were found in his home and some of them were empty.

According to medical experts, Diprivan should be administered only by a medical professional trained in anesthesiology and is typically used by hospitals, not in a private home. A nurse has said that Jackson asked her to obtain the drug for him earlier this year to treat his insomnia, but she told him, “This medication is not safe.”

In a Mayo Clinic study of 31 epilepsy patients who were treated for their seizures with Diprivan, three suffered cardiac arrest and one died. “There was no explanation other than propofol to explain why they ended up with cardiac arrest,” one of the lead researchers said.

Things allegedly went fatally wrong for Forrester in part, his widow alleged, because Dr. Marieta Bajit failed to “make adequate preparations for treating the known risk of respiratory arrest” during anesthesia and then failed to insert a tube into his airway to restore his breathing. Another physician successfully intubated him but he died less than two weeks later after a third heart attack.

The label for Diprivan, which is manufactured by AstraZeneca Pharmaceuticals, says equipment to provide artificial ventilation, supplemental oxygen, and cardiopulmonary resuscitation “must be immediately available.”

Forrester's widow sought $3 million in damages but the case was dismissed in September 2008.

In suburban Detroit, meanwhile, doctors at Botsford General Hospital were accused in May 2006 of Diprivan-related malpractice in the death of Douglas Adams. An Oakland County Circuit Court jury returned a defense verdict in September 2007.

A fourth patient, John Menditto, 73, allegedly suffered a fatal Diprivan overdose in April 2002 at the University of Connecticut's John Dempsey Hospital in Farmington. Details of that case were not available.

By Matthew Heller
7/5/09