THE VATICAN: Pope John Paul last night underwent a tracheotomy, an emergency operation to insert a tube into his windpipe to allow him to breathe more easily, writes Paddy Agnew in Rome
"The operation ... ended successfully. The immediate post-operative progress is regular," a Vatican statement said.
It said surgeons at Rome's Gemelli Hospital had performed a tracheotomy on the Pontiff, cutting a small opening into his neck and windpipe to allow air to flow directly into the lungs.
The operation lasted 30 minutes. The Pope, who gave his consent for the operation, was to spend the night in his hospital room, the statement added, implying he did not need to be treated in an intensive care ward.
For the second time this month, the ailing Pope was rushed earlier yesterday to the hospital, apparently suffering from a relapse of the influenza and consequent breathing problems which first saw him hospitalised on February 1st.
Vatican senior spokesman Dr Joaquin Navarro-Valls confirmed that on Wednesday afternoon the Pope had had "a relapse of the influenza condition which afflicted him in recent weeks". For that reason, the Pope was yesterday transferred to the Gemelli for "specialist assistance and further tests".
If successful, the procedure should alleviate the Pope's breathing difficulties, made worse by Parkinson's disease, a side-effect of which is diminished control over muscle movement.
A side-effect of a tracheotomy is likely to be severe speech impairment but this can be overcome with practice.
Beyond the Vatican's brief statement lay a world of speculation. While independent doctors and medical experts yesterday pointed out that a relapse of a flu condition was nothing unusual, especially among the elderly, other commentators wondered about the decision of the Pope's medical team to send him back to the Gemelli just two weeks after he had left the hospital, apparently cured.
Then, as now, the biggest concern about the infirm 84-year-old Pope concerns his breathing, his lungs and the risk that his flu could develop into pneumonia. Three weeks ago the Vatican reported that he had suffered an acute attack of "laryngospasm" or a blockage of air to the lungs, prompting the frightening sensation of suffocation for periods of up to a minute.
The Pope has for some time had difficulty with his breathing and has often struggled when reading speeches on public ceremonial occasions. That difficulty is obviously exacerbated by the fact that he is wheelchair-bound while the fever and catarrh associated with flu prompted the original crisis three weeks ago.
According to Italian news agency ANSA, the Pope arrived at the Gemelli at around 11.30 yesterday morning. He travelled to the hospital in a regulation ambulance, one that did not bear Vatican insignia or the Vatican coat of arms, probably in an attempt to make his arrival at what is a busy public hospital as discreet as possible. ANSA also reported that the Pope, although on a stretcher, appeared to be fully conscious and alert.
For many, news of the Pope's re-admission to hospital came as a surprise given that only on Wednesday he had addressed his weekly public audience through a half-hour video link-up during which he had appeared relatively strong as he said prayers and greeted pilgrims. Many of those same pilgrims gathered in the freezing rain in St Peter's Square yesterday to pray for the Pope.
At the Gemelli Hospital, on the outskirts of Rome, a "media village" of outside broadcast units sprung up across the hospital carpark from the Pope's tenth-floor private ward.