Prescription drugs linked to Tiger Woods's accident

Prescription drugs may have contributed to Tiger Woods' accident outside his Florida mansion, it has emerged.

The billionaire golfer got embroiled in controversy after smashing his car outside his home on Thanksgiving, seconds after reportedly having a heated argument with wife Elin Nordegren over his alleged affair with New York socialite Rachel Uchitel.

Both Woods and Uchitel have denied the rumours, but since then as many as nine women were said to have stepped forward with claims of romancing the sportsman.

Woods, 33, confessed to letting his family down with "transgressions", promising to "strive to be a better person, and the husband and father that my family deserves."

And now, the Daily Beast has said that there might be a possibility that Woods was on prescription painkillers around the time of the incident, reports CBS News.

On The Early Show Monday, Gerald Posner, the site's chief investigative correspondent said, "Somebody familiar with Tiger's medical treatment, back at the end of 2007, right after he tore his ligament in his left knee, around the time of the British Open, to the end of the year, said that he was dosing with prescription painkillers, opiates, at a time that one doctor was concerned enough about a potential addiction, that he had a personal talk with Tiger to ramp down the dosing.

"And then at the time of the car accident, I spoke to trauma doctors who said when EMT (emergency medical technicians) arrived, what they should have found, you've hit a hydrant, you've smashed into a tree, the rear of your car's been broken with a golf club by your wife, you have lacerations on your face, what happens? Your adrenal glands pump out adrenalin. It shoves blood into your brain and your muscles, and you're hyper-vigilant. That happens whether you're 75 or 15 years old.

"For a 33-year-old world-class athlete like Tiger Woods, he should have been up and around, walking and very alert, with the adrenalin rush...(But) he (was found) laying on the grass, snoring. He fell asleep, which raises the questions for some doctors – was he on sleep agents or possibly on pain medications that may have dulled him? And we can't find out, because the Florida Highway Patrol didn't do a breathalyser, a blood test or a urine test that night."