Pharmacokinetic study of lorazepam overdosage

The authors describe three patients who attempted to commit suicide by ingesting overdoses of lorazepam, an intermediate-acting benzodiazepine that, unlike diazepam, has no active metabolites. All three patients were clinically well within 24-30 hours of ingestion, although high lorazepam concentrations persisted. The authors point out that the elimination half-life of lorazepam after extremely high doses have been ingested is approximately the same as that found after ingestion of usual therapeutic doses.