According to TMZ, Chris Cornell's widow has filed a lawsuit against his doctor for malpractice, accusing the physician of over-prescribing drugs that eventually caused the singer to commit suicide. In the lawsuit, obtained by TMZ, Vicky Cornell claims Dr. Robert Koblin prescribed 940 doses of the anti-anxiety drug Lorazepam (a.k.a. Ativan) as well as Oxycodone during the last 20 months of his life, without even examining the SOUNDGARDEN frontman, performing lab studies or doing anything else to determine if Chris was in danger. The lawsuit alleges the doctor took no steps to protect Chris even though Koblin knew the musician was an "addiction-prone individual." According to the lawsuit, Koblin never warned Chris about the dangers of suicide or other side effects of long-term Lorazepam use. Vicky and her two children are suing for unspecified damages. Back in February, Vicky opened up about her husband's battle with addiction, saying he had struggled with substance abuse at several points during his adult life. Vicky said that his behavior changed after he was prescribed the painkiller benzodiazepine, approximately a year before his death, to help him sleep after a shoulder injury. "In retrospect, I've learned it's not supposed to be given to anyone who's in recovery, and if you have to give it, they have to be closely monitored and it should not be given for more than two or three weeks," she told ABC. "So he relapsed, and in a seven-day period, he took 20-something pills, and in a nine-day period, 33. "He had really delayed speech, he was forgetful, there were moments where I thought there was some confusion," she continued. "The brain of someone who has a substance use disorder is different from that of … someone who doesn't. He relapsed." Cornell was pronounced dead on May 18, 2017 after being found unresponsive in his Detroit hotel room the previous night. SOUNDGARDEN had played a show earlier that evening. The 52-year-old had sedatives and an anxiety drug in his system on the night he died by hanging himself. According to a completed toxicology report released by Michigan's Wayne County Medical Examiner, the drugs didn't contribute to the cause of death. In addition to SOUNDGARDEN, Cornell sang with AUDIOSLAVE and TEMPLE OF THE DOG, while also recording four solo studio albums and one live set on his own.
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