Heath Ledger's Death: Prescription Med Overdose

[3113]

Accidental Probably not new news, but I thought I'd post it anyway:

NEW YORK -- Heath Ledger died of an accidental "abuse of prescription medications," the New York City medical examiner's office said Wednesday in releasing the results of toxicology tests performed on tissue taken from the actor's body two weeks ago. Some type of overdose had been the expected cause of death since a masseuse found the 28-year-old Australian star's unconscious body in his Soho loft Jan. 22, with sleeping pills near his bed and other prescription drugs around the apartment. The lab tests were conducted after an autopsy the next day proved inconclusive.

"Mr. Heath Ledger died as the result of acute intoxica- tion by the combined effects of oxycodone, hydrocodone, diazepam, temazepam, alprazolam and doxylamine," the medi- cal examiner's spokeswoman, Ellen Borakove, said in a written statement. "We have concluded that the manner of death is accident, resulting from the abuse of prescription medications."

The list of generic names refer to drugs more commonly known as the painkillers OxyContin and Vicodin, the antianxiety medications Valium and Xanax, and the sleeping pill Restoril, while Unisom is an antihistamine commonly used as a sleeping aid....Ledger's father, Kim, issued an emotional statement urging others to use prescription drugs with caution and appealing again for privacy for the actor's family. "We remain humble as parents and a family, among millions of people worldwide who may have suffered the tragic loss of a child," said the statement. "Few can understand the hollow, wrenching and enduring agony parents silently suffer when a child predeceases them. Today's results put an end to speculation, but our son's beautiful spirit and enduring memory will forever remain in our hearts....While no medications were taken in excess, we learned today the combination of doctor-prescribed drugs proved lethal for our boy. Heath's accidental death serves as a caution to the hidden dangers of combining prescription medication, even at low dosage."

Medical experts also warned of the dangers of mixing prescription drugs. "All the medications listed are narcotic painkillers or are used as tranquilizers, antianxiety drugs or sleeping medications. Those medications can have a synergistic effect and can reduce the breathing rate to bring on death," said Richard A. Rawson, a UCLA professor of psychiatry and associate director of its Integrated Substance Abuse Programs. "For someone taking medication for sleep and pain on a regular basis, it is possible to take them and to become intoxicated," he said in a telephone interview. "Those drugs are very widely used, prescribed and considered to have a relatively good safety profile. But if you take enough of them, taken in combination with opiates, you can get an overdose death. In this case, someone had legitimate prescriptions and simply made an error in dosing himself, a tragic error."

About 850,000 people annually misuse sedatives, including sleep aids, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. All totaled, 14 million people misuse prescription drugs, including pain relievers, tranquilizers and stimulants, the CDC estimates. Other sleep drugs, even those sold over the counter, as well as prescription tranquilizers, pain medications and alcohol, are especially dangerous in combination with prescription sleeping pills, doctors say. Ledger had made no secret of his use of prescription drugs to help him manage a life that was stressful and hectic, for all his fame.

He had just gotten back from London, where he was filming Terry Gilliam's "The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus," and recently finished his work on "The Dark Knight," the new Batman film opening July 18, which has him following in the on-screen footsteps of Jack Nicholson as the Joker. It was a difficult and physical role for Ledger, who told the New York Times in November that he was having trouble sleeping as he was finishing the shoot: "Last week I probably slept an average of two hours a night," he said at the time. "I couldn't stop thinking. My body was exhausted, and my mind was still going." He also described taking two Ambien sleeping pills and falling into a stupor, then waking up an hour later....

...officials of the Drug Enforcement Administration in Washington said they were conducting a "routine" investigation, as they would in any prescription overdose case, into how Ledger got the drugs that killed him.

 

[elfin_odalisque]

The real question is, surely, why did a young guy like that, with a successful career and an assured future, have to have so many serious prescribed medicaments.

We read the press but never know what is really going on.

 

[rgraham666]

Fame is a killer.

 

[Selena_Kitt]

oxycodone, hydrocodone, diazepam, temazepam, alprazolam and doxylamine

That's a LOT of meds.

He must have been in a great deal of pain...

Which just makes me sadder about the whole thing. It might not have been a conscious suicide attempt... but anyone taking that many meds wants the pain to stop. Somehow.

 

[tickledkitty]

He probably got them from different doctors, so none of them were worried about drug interactions.

 

[cantdog]

The real question is, surely, why did a young guy like that, with a successful career and an assured future, have to have so many serious prescribed medicaments.

We read the press but never know what is really going on.

The press doesn't know either. People complain that they mislead intentionally, but most of the time the reporters just didn't get it themselves.

When I've been there at events reported on, they don't seem to have gotten it. I think it's more than you can expect.

 

[cantdog]

That's a LOT of meds.

He must have been in a great deal of pain...

Which just makes me sadder about the whole thing. It might not have been a conscious suicide attempt... but anyone taking that many meds wants the pain to stop. Somehow.

Pain is preferable to some of those drugs. I know.