Posted by bethesdabob on April 19, 2004, at 18:50:39
"My wife, Barbara, died on 12/16/03. I would be very grateful for the insights of this community.
Barb was an epileptic, she had been having seizures since she was 12, my wife was taking tegritol for years but about a year ago her shrink took her off that and prescribed 900 mgs daily of trileptal and 6 mgs of clonazepam.
In the last months before her death my wife woke up several times and told me that she felt like she had a seizure while she was asleep.
My wife was bipolar and taking many different meds, at the time of her death she was taking 600 mgs of effexor, 90 mgs of remeron, 3 mgs of
risperdal, 40 mgs of adderal, and 10 mgs of ambien at night.She developed high blood pressure, her primary care doctor had her taking 32 mgs of atacand for the past year.
My wife had problems with nausea and vomiting and was frequently constipated, her doctors had her on 10 mg of metoclopramide, 30 mgs of
prevacid, and 25 mgs of promethegan suppository.She developed real bad migraines, to give her relief she was prescribed a bottle (10 mgs) of stadol every week, and imitrex nasal spray.
As if all these meds were not enough, five days before she passed, my wife fell out of bed and hurt her shoulder, the orthopoedist said that
she had torn a rotator cuff in her shoulder and until they were able to operate he gave her tylenol with codeine #3, amd methocarbamol.I woke up on the 16th and looked over on the the other bed, my wife was thrashing about, she said that she felt very bad, that she had been up
most of the previous evening with hot and cold sweats, she said that she had soaked through her nightgown with sweat and thought she must have a
fever, she said that she felt very nauseous and had thrown up several times, she told me that she was having real bad abdominal pain and that
her whole body ached.She told me that she was not going to be able to get up and get the kids ready and asked if I would take them to school. I told her that I would be happy too and to just lay back and relax that I would be back in an
hour or two.I got back about an hour and a half later and went up to check on my wife, I found her lying on her back outside the bathroom, lifeless eyes
staring at the ceiling, there was no pulse, her body was cold, and parts of her hands and face were blue.Her body was taken to the State Medical Examiner's office, about three weeks later I was notified that my wife had died from the results of a seizure disorder.
The pathologist later told me that her brain structure was intact, that there was no sign of any hemorrhage or aneurysm, her heart was clear and disease free, no signs of any cardiac arrest, body organs were all fine, her lungs and air passages were clear and she had not suffocated.
I am looking to achieve some sort of closure, am spending hours every day trying to educate myself and understand what might have caused my
wife to die at age 47. I understand that 600 mgs of effexor xr and 90 mgs of remeron soltab is way in excess of dosage limits. Am also
discovering that 900 mgs of trileptal was a non therapeutic dose for seizures.Do you think that these meds in those dosages might have created the condition in her system that brought about conditions allowing for her
death by seizure disorder.Would you suggest that I contact an attorney to see if there might have been some sort of negligence regarding her care ?
I appreciate any comments on this matter.
poster:bethesdabob
thread:337876
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20040417/msgs/337876.html