Medical Condition Might’ve Saved Her Life, Doctor Says

Christa Pike‘s blood condition may have saved her life temporarily, a doctor says … though he’s making it clear she doesn’t have a super resistance to pentobarbital — the drug that was supposed to kill her.

Dr. Joel Zivot — a respected anesthesiologist who previously examined Christa — sat down with Jakson on TMZ’s YouTube series, “In The Know,” to discuss what happened during Wednesday’s botched execution in Tennessee … telling us he thinks Christa’s thrombocytosis may have played a role.

Basically, Dr. Zivot says Christa has a high platelet count … and platelets rush to the site of an injury to clot the blood — keeping humans from bleeding out if they get a paper cut.

An IV punctures the vein … so platelets rush to the area and, in a person like Christa with thrombocytosis, excessive clots can form inside the vein, blocking it off entirely.

Dr. Zivot says he thinks that this might’ve happened and — when the medical team tried to inject the pentobarbital — the vein stretched and then burst open.

Pentobarbital kills a person only if there’s enough of it at one time in the bloodstream … by leaking into the tissues, it couldn’t kill Christa.

We already know Christa’s botched execution has taken its toll on her … her lawyers say she is unconscious and needs a ventilator to breathe.

Christa — who is on death row after being found guilty of murdering Colleen Klemmer back in 1995 — was rushed to a local hospital after she could be heard snoring through the execution … which took an hour to get underway because doctors seemingly couldn’t find a vein to inject her.

Tennessee Governor Bill Lee has postponed all executions in the state until the conclusion of a thorough review into what exactly went wrong this week.