Can a reaction to pain medication cause heart failure?

Posted by Heather on June 30, 1999 at 09:51:30
My father (49 yrs. old, 6'4", 250 lbs, retired police officer) was in a fairly serious car accident on Sun, 6-20-99, Father's Day.  Take to ER with a broken pelvis, several broken ribs, a contusion on his spleen, and several bruises, internal and external.  Dr. said that he was in serious condition and in a lot of pain (for which they administered Morphine on a regular basis), but none of his injuries were life-threatening, so the Dr. expected a full recovery.  However, they were going to keep an eye on the spleen because it was building fluid, and it may need to be removed.
After spending 3 days in ICU, Dad seemed to slowly be making progress.  However, he had developed a slight fever along with an elevated white blood cell count, which indicated an infection, and they were having trouble isolating the source.  Nevertheless, they moved him to a private room last Wednesday.  He was awake and coherent and even making jokes.
On Saturday, they decided to start weaning him off of the Morphine, so they administered a dose of another pain medication called Toradol (or Toradof, I'm not completely sure of the spelling).  Within 20 minutes or so, my father's blood pressure dropped dramatically, and then his heart just stopped.  Of course the usually barrage of doctors and nurses rushed in, and fortunately got his heart started again.  Now my father is back in ICU in critical condition.  He is on a ventilator, is occasionally semi-conscious, and has had to be strapped to his bed because he tries to pull out the various tubes and IV