Diagnosis Unknown

A classic case of Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy, Genene Jones killed at least 47 patients with the muscle relaxant succinylcholine while working at Bexar Medical Center in Texas. She loved creating emergencies, the excitement of a “code blue” and especially the reactions of family members when told of the death of a loved one. She wailed endlessly at the death of each patient and insisted on accompanying the body to the morgue.

Death seemed to follow Donald Harvey from job to job, beginning in 1970 and ending with his arrest in 1987. Harvey – probably the most prolific serial murderer in the nation’s history – claimed to have murdered his ailing charges out of compassion, but his meticulous diary, 30 pounds of cyanide, and a witch’s brew of dangerous drugs discovered in his home pointed to darker motives.

Dr. Harold “Fred” Shipman was known as a dedicated, hardworking and community-minded doctor who spent his life gaining the trust of his patients and the respect of his colleagues. And for 25 years, nobody suspected that the town doctor was amassing a death toll that would make him one of history’s most prolific serial killers.

Reverend Dwight Moore is at death’s door when he is transferred from his local hospital to Memorial Hospital in Chapel Hill. Doctors can’t find of the cause of Moore’s symptoms: stomach pain, numbness, and hallucinations. His devoted wife Blanche tries to comfort him by bringing his favorite banana pudding from home. When Moore’s vital functions begin to shut down, a visiting specialist examines him and notices white striation lines on his fingernails, an indication of arsenic poisoning.

In an exclusive Kansas City suburb cardiologist Mike Farrar is stricken with a powerful and mysterious stomach illness. The violent and terrifying symptoms are relentless, leaving the man fighting for his life. Mike’s doctors struggle to find the source of the disease that is making him waste away before their eyes. The answer soon comes when Mike makes a strange discovery hidden away in his wife’s purse; several packets of castor beans, each one warning the user that the seeds are highly toxic.

Phil Rouss realizes a lifelong dream when he opens an antique auto restoration business with his long-time friend Steve White. They divide the work – Rouss will restore the cars and Steve will handle the books. The business is an immediate success, but within weeks Rouss is struck down with a mysterious illness. He wakes at night bathed in sweat, has such severe chest pains he’s sure he’s having a heart attack and eventually develops a rare lung fungus.

Robert Curley is newly married and is renovating an old home for his wife, Joann. Within weeks of starting the new projects he becomes violently ill. His feet and hands tingle for no apparent reason. Doctors diagnose him and send him home with medication, but that doesn't work. Joann decides to remove Robert from life support. At the same time doctors discover he has been poisoned with thallium. For the past year his wife has been slowly poisoning him with the iced tea he took to work every day.

Middle School teacher Donna Boley is overcome with nausea and a tingling feeling in her extremities. The principal finds Donna crawling up the stairs on her hands and knees. He tells her to go home. At home, Donna's husband, Jim, tries to nurse her back to health. They believe she might have caught something during their recent vacation in Missouri.

When two young children in Idaho are diagnosed with food poisoning, doctors have no idea that within days the situation will get out of control, as two hundred thousand people fall ill in the country's largest case of single source food poisoning.