This is not the best part of that interview. I've been looking for the clip since it aired. Dr Treacy goes on to say that Michael only WANTED people to think he was addicted to drugs, and that things do not add up. He gave a look like he did not believe any of this! The one raised eyebrow look! Unfortunately, Dr Drew cut him off... without asking what he meant??? It seems the best part of this interview has mysteriously been edited out. Gone with the wind...
I found the transcript of the interview.
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LoginPINSKY: Welcome back. We`re going to go to Ryan Smith for the latest on the Conrad Murray trial in just a few minutes. But first, I`m speaking exclusively with a physician who says he gave Michael Jackson the drug, propofol, on two different occasions.
Cosmetic dermatologist, Dr. Patrick Treacy, first met Michael when he treated the King of Pop for vitiligo. He says he was not only Michael`s doctor but a friend, and he joins us now from Ireland. Dr. Treacy, first of all, tell us, if you don`t mind when, where, and why you gave Michael propofol?
DR. PATRICK TREACY, COSMETIC SURGEON FOR MICHAEL JACKSON: Dr. Drew, I suppose there are issues relating to medical confidentiality in this, and to an extent because it is in the public interest, I can say some things. Michael had derma fillers in his face, the area around his nose, just in this area here.
He was very hypersensitive because of previous sort of surgery that he had had, and as a consequence, he wanted sedation prior to getting sort of some fillers in space. Now, Michael requested an anesthetist to be present. I`ve treated Michael, I supposed, five or six times, but in the two times that he received propofol in Ireland, an anesthesiologist was always present and that was always his request.
PINSKY: Are you as concerned as I am that he keeps being called an insomniac and that here`s what using for insomnia, anesthesia, basically? And by the way, what is the cause of his insomnia? At no point do I see any of the physicians were treating that insomnia attempting to decide is he in withdrawal? Is he depressed?
Does he have hyperthyroidism? Is there something else causing this insomnia? No diagnosis, only the symptom of insomnia, which is the same thing as saying they`re treating a fever.
TREACY: Sure.
PINSKY: Very disturbing.
TREACY: OK. What my most serious concern -- my most serious concern about this case and I watched it last night is the fact that sort of, you know, the defense immediately turned around and said that Michael Jackson could have killed himself by given him a syringe of propofol. And a syringe was found underneath the bed. OK. If we know the facts, why is propofol so popular with anesthesiologists?
If you give an injection of it, there is no antidote, but it`s going to last four minutes and wears off. So, if he took a 20 mil syringe himself, the most he can give himself a shot of is 200 milligrams, which would only keep him asleep for four minutes, and he`d wake up again. So, it`s almost physically impossible that Michael Jackson could have killed himself.
PINSKY: I completely agree. That part I`m 100 percent in agreement with you on that. And this idea of it being a perfect storm that killed him instantly is also a bizarre notion, because, you know, when you get respiratory suppression from the --
TREACY: Absolutely.
PINSKY: I`m talking about the combination of drugs he was on, but even let`s say, it was enough to cause respiratory suppression, you`re looking at quite a period of time before somebody is dead. I will play a little tape for you of exactly this issue in court. Watch this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We believe the evidence will show you, the scientific evidence, will show you that when Dr. Murray left the room, Michael Jackson self-administered a dose of propofol that with the lorazepam created a perfect storm in his body that killed him instantly.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PINSKY: There`s no other way to understand what he received and how he responded to it, except the fact that he must have been severely tolerant to benzodiazepines to not have been knocked completely unconscious by the combination of medicines he was on. Wouldn`t you say?
TREACY: To an extent, Dr. Drew, I totally agree with you. But we also, I supposed, have to look at the coroner`s report and the toxicology, and we know he died of acute propofol toxicity. That levels that were there enough to cause toxicity. So, no matter what way they want to put a spin on it, there`s no way he could have done it to himself.
The only person that could have done it was the doctor who was there, because you would have to manually run a maintenance dose in order to keep him asleep. So, if he woke up, give himself a shot, he`d wake up again in four minutes, so it makes no logical sense the argument they`re putting forward.
So, we got a doctor who, probably, has for one reason or another, give him too much propofol, has done it in the absence of an IV giving set, has done it outside the normal parameters of the hospital (ph) environment, has done it without being able to resuscitate a patient, has done it without having even any tranquil apparatus present.
You know, sort have been the pulse oximeter (ph), and IV (INAUDIBLE) in other rooms. There`s a lot of things that certainly will come out, but, all I can say is during the period that I knew Michael Jackson, he certainly was not addicted to any drugs.
(CROSSTALK)
PINSKY: Now, in 1993, Michael, himself, said he`d become addicted to painkillers while taking medicines after surgery. Listen to this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MICHAEL JACKSON, ENTERTAINER: I became increasingly more dependent on the painkillers to get me through the days of my tour. My friends and doctors advised me to seek professional guidance immediately in order to eliminate what has become an addiction. It is time for me to acknowledge my need for treatment in order to regain my health.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PINSKY: So, here`s the deal for me. There he is saying I`m an opiate addict. And opiate addiction is a lifelong condition. This is what I can`t get through everybody`s head. That`s a lifelong disorder. And somebody with opiate addiction is exposed to addictive drugs, their disease is active again.
That`s just the way that condition works. One of the questions that people keep having is, how did -- go ahead, I`m sorry.
TREACY: Sure. You and I know, you`re a toxicologist that if you take opiates often enough, everybody becomes addicted.
PINSKY: No, no, no. That`s not true. No, no. That`s absolutely wrong. Wait, I`m going to interrupt you, because everyone -- no, listen. Everyone becomes dependent.
TREACY: OK.
PINSKY: Everyone becomes dependent. But an addict is the individual whose mind has been changed forever once you take them off the drugs. They have forever a persistent drive and motivational disturbance that never goes away. That`s the addict. The dependent human being --
(CROSSTALK)
TREACY: OK. That`s -- I`m sorry. That`s not my field of expertise. You know yourself, propofol isn`t a drug you become addicted to. You know yourself also that if you drunk propofol, you couldn`t put yourself to sleep, it would probably burn the back of your throat, you know, so, I think there`s a lot of other reasons why Michael Jackson maybe wanted to be labeled as a drug addict.
One of them, and I don`t want to go into conspiracy theory here, maybe, we know that if Michael Jackson died of natural causes or if he was complicit in his own death or committed suicide, the way the insurance payout is going to be totally different than if he sort of died because a doctor gave him too much of a drug. That`s the first thing.
The second thing is if you look at Dr. Murray`s sort of background in all this, he said he could cover him in the United Kingdom when he come over. Michael contacted me just before that. I looked up the GMC registration and the MCI in Ireland. Dr. Conrad Murray is not registered in either country.
So, I don`t see how he could give any drug within this jurisdiction to any patient, private or public. You know, so, there`s a whole a lot of things that sort of don`t add up with this.
PINSKY: You know, that`s a really interesting point. I wondered about that myself. What his plan was when Michael went overseas? Why he`s going to try to get a local physician or something? And your point has well taken on that.
I will say one thing about the propofol, though. We do see anesthesiologist in this country that get addicted to propofol, but you`re right, it takes a lot of work -- it takes into propofol. It takes more work to get it outside of a hospital, which is the really stunning part about this, but thank you very much, Dr. Treacy. I really do appreciate it.
TREACY: I -- I
PINSKY: Go ahead.
TREACY: You`re very, very welcome.
PINSKY: OK. Thank you so much. And, hopefully, we`ll talk to you again soon.
