Actors Melissa Rivers, Left, And Joan Rivers.
IN PHOTO: Actors Melissa Rivers (L) and Joan Rivers smile as they arrive for the 58th annual Primetime Emmy Awards at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles August 27, 2006. Reuters/Fred Prouser

The anesthesiologist considered a party to Joan Rivers' botched throat procedure is finally revealed. The anesthesiologist was accused of not doing her job correctly, contributing to the simple procedure that turned fatal for the comedienne, but she was not publicly identified before, until today.

The Post learned that the anesthesiologist involved in Joan Rivers' throat procedure is Renuka Reddy Bankulla. She is touted as the third medical expert who can be held responsible for why a simple procedure turned out to be deadly. The other two doctors being held responsible are Yorkville Endoscopy medical director Lawrence Cohen as well as celebrity EMT specialist Gwen Korovin. Renuka Reddy Bankulla is said to have a large role behind the botched procedure because she was not able to do what anesthesiologists should do in these operations. Anesthesiologists are not merely tasked to administer anesthesia and sedatives. Rather, They must be alert and quick, "vigilantly watch the patient's heart rate, blood pressure and other vital signs," to ensure the patient can breathe, and "intervene promptly" when the patient is in trouble, said Dr. Karen Sibert, a private anesthesiologist in Los Angeles and an expert in treating high-risk adults.

An earlier federal report claimed that Joan Rivers was given inappropriate dosage of anesthetic. The report claimed that a serious oversight was committed when the Upper East side doctors who operated on did not weighed her first to know the definite amount of anesthetic that she should receive before undergoing the throat procedure. According to the Post, when Bankulla was approached outside her residence in Scarsdale, she jumped in a car and quickly left. Her lawyer Bruce Brady commented that their camp has nothing to comment on the subject. The anesthesiologist has nothing to comment since the fateful day when Joan Rivers underwent the throat procedure at the East 93rd Street Clinic.

The E talk show host and comedienne is said to be in the clinic to find out what is causing her hoarseness when she suffered a cardiac arrest. She went into a coma and died on Sept. 4 at the age of 81. Investigators working for the US Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services already asked the anesthesiologist to participate in the inquiry, but Bankulla declined to cooperate., claimed that she was given the advice from her counsel not to discuss anything. Before she was publicly identified, she was labeled as "Staff #2." The only thing she initially shared after Joan Rivers died was that she gave Joan 120 milligrams of Propofol, denying the 300 milligrams stated in the medical records. She said the overstatement of milligrams can be explained by a technical glitch, wherein she mistakenly "double-clicked" on computerized records.