According to a report from the Los Angeles County Medical Examiner on Thursday, Lisa Marie Presley’s death in January at the age of 54 was caused by a small bowel obstruction — concluding that she died from natural causes. Per reporting from TMZ, the obstruction was caused by “adhesions that developed during bariatric surgery (gastric bypass) years ago. This is a known long term complication of this type of surgery.”
Presley’s autopsy indicates that she “complained of abdominal pain on the morning of her death,” and was later taken from her home in Calabasas, California to a nearby hospital, suffering cardiac arrest.
A toxicology report released moments after the news of her official cause of death indicates that “there were therapeutic levels of Oxycodone in her blood,” along with a second opioid called Buprenorphine, used to treat opioid overuse. These medications are tied to a cosmetic procedure she’d had a few months before her death and it’s noted that “she had a history of ‘overmedicating,’ and was known to forget she had taken her meds and would take them again.” Per TMZ, “The coroner says there was no drug paraphernalia or narcotics found at her home when she was rushed to the hospital [in January]. Her urine toxicology screen was negative.” Lisa Marie was the only known child of Elvis Presley, who died in 1977 after also suffering cardiac arrest at the age of 42.