Former US president Clinton has heart operation

Former US president Bill Clinton underwent a sudden heart operation Thursday after complaining of chest pains, but was in good spirits afterwards, his advisor said.Clinton, 63, was taken to hospital in New York “after feeling discomfort in his chest,” Douglas Band said in a statement sent to AFP.

“Following a visit to his cardiologist, he underwent a procedure to place two stents in one of his coronary arteries.” His wife, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, rushed from Washington to the Columbia Campus of New York Presbyterian Hospital to be with her husband.

The State Department said she decided to delay her departure on a planned trip to the Gulf by one day, to Saturday.President Barack Obama telephoned Clinton to wish him a speedy recovery and was told by the ex-president that he felt “absolutely great,” a White House official said.Band also said that Clinton emerged from the operation “in good spirits, and will continue to focus on the work of his foundation and Haiti’s relief and long-term recovery efforts.” George W. Bush, a Republican who replaced Clinton in the White House and is now working alongside him as a relief coordinator for Haiti, said he was “glad” to hear Clinton felt better. In 2004 Clinton underwent quadruple bypass surgery to free four blocked arteries.

On Thursday, stent tubes were inserted into the body to prevent constrictions by unblocking arteries and assisting blood flow. While in the White House, Clinton famously indulged his appetites, including junk food, but in his post-presidential days he appeared to have been adhering to a stricter diet as well as a busy work schedule.In a 2005 interview just months after the bypass surgery, he told CNN that prior to going under the knife he realized “I was very close to having a serious heart attack. -AFP