Kevin Rudd - Heart Valve Surgery Before Australian Prime Minister
Blog Topics: Kevin Rudd, Australian Prime Minister; Heart Valve Replacement Patient; Tissue Valve From Human Donor; Homograft; Rheumatic Fever
It looks like Arnold Schwarzenegger isn’t the only well-known politician to have had heart valve replacement surgery!
Kevin Rudd has had to answer questions about the state of his ticker.
The man who would be the next Australian Prime Minister revealed last night that, about 15 years ago, he had a cardiac operation to replace his aortic valve with one from another person.
Kevin Rudd said the faulty heart valve was caused by childhood rheumatic fever, that the operation was “a standard procedure” and he’d been “fit as a fiddle ever since”.
According to heart specialists, Kevin Rudd might eventually need another heart valve surgery, possibly within 10 years. But Kevin Rudd says he has received no such indication from his doctors.
He went public about his heart valve replacement surgery in September, 2007 after details were leaked to Channel Nine.
Labor suspects the story was leaked by pro-Coalition sources, and that it is part of a wider push to smear Kevin Rudd. It came in the same week that Nationals senator Barnaby Joyce tried unsuccessfully to table documents about an alleged cover-up in Queensland when Mr Rudd worked for the Goss government.
And it surfaced on the same day Mr Rudd was caught out not knowing details of the income tax scales, prompting a withering attack on his economic credentials by Treasurer Peter Costello.
A spokesman for Mr Rudd said Labor did not know the source of the leak on his heart valve health.
Commenting on the leak, Mr Rudd told The Age: “Politics seems to be getting rougher and rougher and more personal. It’s a very tough business … but I’m a very tough person.”
Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said he had never heard of Mr Rudd’s heart valve health problem. “I see him day in and day out and he looks perfectly healthy to me,” he told the ABC’s Lateline.
Mr Rudd told Channel Nine that many people had a similar operation. “It was out of an abundance of caution that I think they recommend this happen 14, 15 years ago,” he said.
Chris Merry, a cardiac surgery fellow at the Royal Children’s Hospital, said it seemed Kevin Rudd had had a procedure called a homograft valve replacement. He said about 50 per cent of people would need it replaced after 15 years. “Maybe he’s in the 50 per cent that doesn’t need replacing.” Dr Merry said the signs for Mr Rudd looked good but he would probably need a valve replacement, possibly in 10 years.
Baker Heart Research Institute director Garry Jennings said Mr Rudd should be alert, not alarmed. “After 14 years of presumably uncomplicated progress, then the prospects are very good,” he said.
Asked if he had been told the heart valve had a use-by date, Mr Rudd said: “No I haven’t been told that. Sounds like wishful thinking on the part of some.” He said he had annual check-ups and there were “no indications about any subsequent work needing to be done”.
Keep on tickin Kevin Rudd!!!
About The Author: Adam Pick is a double, heart valve surgery patient and author of The Patient’s Guide To Heart Valve Surgery, a unique book which integrates the clinical facts of heart valve surgery with the personal experiences of an actual heart valve surgery patient. To learn more about Adam and his heart valve surgery book, click here.
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