Autopsy on nurse finds drugs
                  
                  
By Jill Taylor, Palm Beach Post Staff 
                  Writer
Friday, May 10, 2002
                  
                  
STUART -- A nurse found dead of a drug overdose in a 
                  hospital restroom April 10 had at least three different drugs 
                  in her system, including two injectable drugs normally found 
                  in hospitals, toxicology reports show.
                  Jessica Viscount, 28, was a recovery room nurse at Martin 
                  Memorial Medical Center and apparently entered the bathroom 
                  with several vials of drugs and locked the door behind her 
                  sometime after her shift ended.
                  Medical Examiner Roger Mittleman, who received the 
                  preliminary reports this week, said Viscount had extremely 
                  high levels of Prozac, an anti-depressant that had been 
                  prescribed for her to treat depression.
                  But the other two drugs, tranquilizer Diazepam and pain 
                  reliever Dilaudid, likely came from hospital supplies that 
                  were not prescribed for her, Mittleman said.
                  A syringe near her body had traces of Diazepam and it's 
                  suspected she injected that drug into the back of her hand 
                  where the autopsy revealed several injection sites. An empty 
                  morphine bottle was found in a trash can near the body, but 
                  Mittleman said the preliminary test results do not show any 
                  morphine in her system.
                  "We are testing for other drugs that were available to 
                  her," he said. "The toxicology analysis is not complete."
                  Until all the results are available in three or four weeks, 
                  Mittleman will not decide whether the death was an accidental 
                  or intentional overdose. But he is certain a combination of 
                  drugs caused her death.
                  Although the fact that the preliminary tests show high 
                  levels of Prozac, a drug in pill form for which she had a 
                  prescription and presumably knew the proper dosage, Mittleman 
                  said he is not leaning toward a deliberate overdose because he 
                  did not find evidence of recently swallowed pills during the 
                  autopsy.
                  The levels of Diazepam and Dilaudid were relatively 
low.
                  He said he was told she had missed some Prozac doses and 
                  may have taken extra pills to make up for it. The extra Prozac 
                  could have reacted with the other drugs and brought about a 
                  fatal overdose that she might otherwise have survived.
                  But Mittleman said he can't say for sure until all the 
                  results are in.
                  "That (the Prozac) is the only thing that makes me wonder a 
                  little bit," he said. "I'm leaning toward calling this an 
                  accidental death."
                  Part of the reason is information from her family 
                  indicating that Viscount had been struggling with addiction 
                  for some time and had taken to wearing bandages on her hands, 
                  possibly to conceal injection sites, Mittleman said.
                  Meanwhile, Stuart police are waiting for the final autopsy 
                  report before issuing their findings.
                  Hospital spokeswoman Pat Austin said Martin Memorial has 
                  reviewed the procedures for issuing and tracking medications 
                  and is satisfied they followed all state, federal and 
                  accreditation requirements.
                  And a review of records and patient charts did not show any 
                  evidence that drugs were diverted from patients who needed 
                  them, Austin said.
                  However, it is possible that unused portions of drug vials 
                  that were supposed to disposed of were not properly thrown 
                  away.
                  There are ways that someone could foil the system if they 
                  were determined enough, Austin said.
                  "That's where it becomes difficult," she said. "It's a 
                  terrible tragedy, but we may never know exactly what 
                  happened."
                  
                  
jill_taylor@pbpost.com
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