Elvis Presley’s Dr. Feelgood: Secrets He Took To The Grave!

Dr. Nick was Elvis' personal physician for 11 years, and gave the rock legend a wide range of medications — including laxatives, sleeping pills, amphetamines, downers and hormones. The King had 14 different drugs in his system when he died of a drug-induced heart attack. The sudden death of his longtime patient would bring Dr. Nick some very unwelcome attention.

Nichopoulos was indicted by the Tennessee Medical Board in 1980 for overprescribing sleeping pills, narcotics and amphetamines to Elvis and many other patients. Dr. Nick was accused of prescribing more than 100,000 doses of narcotics and other medications to patients over a two-year period. The board also cited drugs given to Elvis' fellow rocker Jerry Lee Lewis "without a legitimate medical purpose."

The board document detailing the new charges didn't cite Jerry Lee Lewis by name, but an investigation by The National ENQUIRER left no doubt that the "entertainer" cited as merely "J.L." was the legendary "Great Balls of Fire" singer. The document disclosed that between 1988 and 1989, Lewis received numerous injections from Dr. Nichopoulos of the narcotic Demerol and other medications, including amphetamines.

Dr. Nick hadn't just offended his fellow doctors, either. It was no secret in Memphis that Dr. Nick was providing Elvis with plenty of prescription drugs. He was shot in the chest in 1979 while watching a football game — and while the assailant was never caught, Dr. Nick had to concede years later that the gunman was probably an angry Elvis fan.

Jerry Lee Lewis continued to support Dr. Nick, and said: "I owe him my life!" In 1975, Dr. Nick told The ENQUIRER about how he was trying to get Elvis back to a healthy lifestyle. "I've told him to improve his eating habits and get more exercise," said Dr. Nick in an exclusive interview. And in an eerie foreshadowing of his own theory on Elvis' death, Dr. Nick revealed that his client had recently endured painful abdominal cramps for nearly two months before agreeing to be hospitalized.

Doctors diagnosed intestinal blockage, and put Elvis on a strict diet of liquids and baby foods. "I told him to stay off laxatives and eat foods like prunes and All-Bran," said Dr. Nick — who was then more concerned with treating Elvis' father Vernon, who had also recently been hospitalized after a heart attack.

Elvis' girlfriend Ginger Alden later told The ENQUIRER about how Dr. Nick was summoned to Graceland on the afternoon that she found the rock 'n roll icon's dead body in a bathroom. The doctor arrived just in time to get in the ambulance that was taking Elvis' unresponsive body to the hospital.

"The ambulance came and took Elvis away," she recalled. "Everyone was walking around praying. I was in complete shock. It seemed like hours that we waited. Then Dr. George Nichopoulos walked in. He went up to [Vernon] Presley, shook his head and said: 'I'm sorry.'" Dr. Nick would later serve as a pallbearer at Elvis' funeral.

The Tennessee Board of Medical Examiners would find Dr. Nick guilty of overprescription, but only imposed a three-month suspension of his license. But in 1995, Nichopoulos had his license permanently revoked by the board over more charges of writing excessive prescriptions. Dr. Nick (seen here carrying the bag of Elvis' one-time girlfriend Linda Thompson) said that he was only trying to treat chronic pain, adding: "I cared too much."

After being stripped of his license in 1995, Dr. Nick was briefly hired by Jerry Lee Lewis to serve as his road manager. Five years later, The ENQUIRER revealed that Dr. Nick had outraged Elvis fans by putting together a ghoulish traveling exhibit built around the medications that he had prescribed for the dead rock 'n roller!

"The prescriptions were all filled a day or two before he died," boasted Dr. Nick. "One's a vitamin. Some are to do with his arthritis and high blood pressure. There are drugs for his migraines, sinus and digestive problems, and things to help him sleep. There's also [the strong narcotic pain reliever] Dilaudid!" The disgraced doc also later auctioned off his old medical bag (pictured here) that he used to supply Elvis with drugs.

An outraged Jack Soden, head of Elvis Presley Enterprises, blasted Dr. Nick's drug-ridden "Memories of Elvis" exhibit as "tacky, tasteless and unfortunate." But Dr. Nick claimed to have cashed in by drawing over 10,000 people at $10 a pop. "I don't have any qualms about charging money for it," insisted Dr. Nick. "The comments I get from the people who've seen it are all positive!"

In his own sad final days, Dr. Nick was confined to a wheelchair and  desperately tried to clear his name. He told The ENQUIRER in 2014: "I miss Elvis and I think about him almost daily. It hurts me. It’s not fair. I was the person that was trying to keep Elvis alive. Elvis wasn’t murdered, and it wasn’t the number of drugs that he was taking. He suffered from bad constipation and blockage of the bowel. Doctors didn’t diagnose that!”