Friends star Matthew Perry died from “the acute effects of ketamine,” the Los Angeles County Medical Examiner’s Office revealed in an autopsy report on Friday.
Perry, 54 at the time of his death on Oct. 28, was found floating face down in his jacuzzi, with authorities pronouncing him dead not long after.
The autopsy listed drowning, coronary artery disease, and buprenorphine effects as contributing factors to Perry’s death, but noted they weren’t the primary cause.
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Ketamine is a dissociative anesthetic that has some hallucinogenic effects, and can be deadly if too much is consumed at a time, according to the American Addiction Center.
Perry had been taking ketamine infusion therapy to treat depression and anxiety, but the coroner’s report concluded that the amount of the drug in his system could not have been from his treatment, suggesting he may have been using ketamine recreationally.
The report said the ketamine found in Perry’s body “could not be from that infusion therapy,” since ketamine’s half-life doesn’t exceed four hours.
“At the high levels of ketamine found in his postmortem blood specimens, the main lethal effects would be from both cardiovascular overstimulation and respiratory depression,” the report said.
The actor struggled with addiction for several years, but reports just prior to his death said he’d been clean for 19 months. On the night of his death, Perry reportedly played hours of pickleball.
