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American Morning
Federal Prosecutors in Missouri Afraid Kansas City Pharmacist May Have Done More Damage Than Thought
Aired April 23, 2002 - 09:05 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
JACK CAFFERTY, CNN ANCHOR: Federal prosecutors this morning in the state of Missouri are afraid that a Kansas City pharmacist who has admitted to diluting drugs for profit may have done a lot more damage than initially thought.
At the time, 49-year-old Robert Courtney pleaded guilty in February to tampering with life-saving drugs mostly for cancer patients. Authorities thought that his actions affected about three dozen people. Now it appears that Courtney may have diluted drug mixtures prescribed for 4200 patients over the last decade. It's astonishing.
Prescriptions include chemotherapy drugs, liquid forms AIDS medicine, antibiotics, narcotics. Kim Comfort's mother was one of Courtney's alleged victims. And she joins us this morning now from Kansas City. Kim, good morning. It's nice to see you.
KIMBERLY COMFORT, DAUGHTER OF ALLEGED DILUTED DRUG VICTIM: Good morning.
CAFFERTY: Your mother died a year ago February from ovarian cancer. And I'm just curious how you first began to suspect that maybe there was something wrong with her medication.
COMFORT: We didn't know anything was wrong until the story broke in August of the dilutions. And at that time, we just happened to catch it on the news. And at the time I saw it on the news, the day the story broke, I just knew. They didn't even say that day what drugs he had tampered with. And I just had a gut feeling and then the next day they said that it was Taxol and Gemzar and my mother had been on both of those drugs. And I had just - I just knew - I just - the chills that came over me. I just knew.
CAFFERTY: I can imagine. It must have just been unbelievable. How were you able to go about confirming your suspicions were right on target?
COMFORT: Well our family contacted the FBI and through their investigations it - it appears that my mother did get some of the diluted drugs. Her doctor was the doctor that turned him in and was getting her medications from Courtney's pharmacy.
CAFFERTY: For how long a period of time was she taking these prescriptions that he had filled?
COMFORT: As far as we know, from January of '98 until just before she died in February of 2001.
CAFFERTY: So two years, during which time obviously her quality of life if nothing else could have been vastly improved had she been taking the prescriptions at full strength, right?
COMFORT: Oh, very definitely. She wanted to live. She told a friend of hers that every day she lived with a gift from God and she didn't care if part of that day she spent with her head hung over the toilet stool from the side effects of the chemotherapy, that at least she was alive and was able to be with her family. And when we look back on it now, things could have been so much different for her.
CAFFERTY: Sure. Now, in addition of filing a lawsuit against the pharmacist, which obviously is very understandable, you're also suing them - we have another guest on the screen, which I'll get to in a moment - you're also suing two of the drug companies; Bristol-Myers and Eli Lily. Tell me a little about what the idea is there.
COMFORT: Well from all indications from the investigations that are being done, the drug companies knew about his activities at least 17 months prior to when the story broke here in Kansas City in August of last year. And they decided that upon an internal investigation from what we're told they found that their drugs were OK when they left the plant so they didn't feel like they had an obligation to say anything.
CAFFERTY: Wow.
COMFORT: Even though people's lives were at stake. So we are - our purpose is to hold them accountable for their actions. Certainly had they have said something when they first found out about it, countless numbers is what we're looking at now, countless numbers peoples of lives could have been very different. My mother's life could have been very different.
CAFFERTY: Sure. Also with us this morning, on the broadcast, is Lois Kollmeyer. She joins us from Jefferson City, Missouri. She's the Director for Missouri's Division of Health Standards and Licensure, which is the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services. The latest information Lois - it's nice to have you with us as well - is that he may have diluted medicines that affected 4200 people over the course of time he was doing this. And it seems like obvious question. But how is it possible that he could do that much damage without any detection?
LOIS KOLLMEYER, DIRECTOR, MISSOURI DIVISION OF HEALTH STANDARDS: Well a lot of the issues are related to the fact that when you dilute medication the record keeping is the key because we inspect the pharmacy-based upon medications that come in, medications that go out and the record-keeping that's done. So if that all matched, there wouldn't have been any way for us to detect it until people started complaining. CAFFERTY: And it's not inconceivable that the same thing could be going on some place else right now virtually undetected based on the system you just described. There's no way of knowing, is there?
KOLLMEYER: There's no way of knowing but we have - we have not come across an instance like this in years. I think this is a very unusual activity for a pharmacy to do. They're highly dedicated people and this is not a normal practice.
CAFFERTY: Is there a solution? Is there any way that this thing can be monitored more closely or detected more easily so that we don't have a situation like this develop again?
KOLLMEYER: Well I think that it's very important for consumers to have good communication with their pharmacy and with their physician. They need to know what it is that medication ought to be doing and make sure their physician knows if the medication isn't doing the right thing, they're not feeling as well as they should be feeling. They need to know from the doctor what is expected of the medication and tell the doctor if things aren't going well. And then ...
CAFFERTY: That's a bit of a gray area, though, isn't it? I mean realistically if someone is chronically ill and has been for a long period of time with degenerative disease like cancer or some other one, the effects of medication vary even from day to day. And it's a tough thing to pin down, is it not? You call the doctor say, gee, I'm not sure this is working exactly the way it's supposed to. And I mean, how do you know?
KOLLMEYER: Absolutely. It is a gray area and that's because - that's the reason why the communication needs to be so good between the caregivers and the family and the patient. And, also, if there's any questions at all the Department of Health and Senior Services as well as the Board of Pharmacy can get involved and check things out and begin to search and look and make sure that things are OK.
CAFFERTY: Lois Kollmeyer, Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services, thank you for joining us this morning from Jefferson City and from Kansas City, Missouri Kim Comfort the daughter of a victim of this unscrupulous pharmacist's behavior. Thank you both for being with us. I appreciate it.
COMFORT: Thank you.
KOLLMEYER: Thank you
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