Tokyo Women's Medical University Hospital said Thursday its outside panel has determined that its decision to use propofol on children against the advice of its maker might have contributed to the deaths of five children in its intensive care unit over the past six years.
The five were among 11 children who died after being administered the powerful sedative, which was at the center of pop star Michael Jackson's death, while on ventilators in the hospital's ICU.
The medicine's inserts advise against using propofol when treating artificially ventilated children under 15 in ICUs, but the advice is nonbinding and doctors are left to use the drug at their discretion.