• Vatican Pope hospitalized for operation due to risk of intestinal obstruction

The abdominal hernia operation to which Pope Francis was subjected on Wednesday at the Gemelli hospital in Rome, for which he had to receive general anesthesia, has ended without complications, the Vatican has confirmed.

"The surgery is over. It has developed without complications and has lasted three hours, "explains a brief statement from the Holy See, which for the moment has not offered more details.

The 86-year-old pontiff will have to stay a few days hospitalized and the Prefecture of the Pontifical Household, which manages his agenda, canceled all its activities on Wednesday until June 18.

The Pope was then transferred to the pontifical apartment of the Gemelli, on the tenth floor, according to local media.

Francis received general anesthesia, the Holy See confirmed in a statement this morning. The surgery was carried out by the team of surgeon Sergio Alfieri, who already operated on the colon two years ago.

Specifically, he has undergone a laparotomy in an abdominal incisional hernia, probably produced after his colon operation two years ago, at the risk that it could cause an intestinal obstruction.

The Vatican explained that "the operation, ordered in recent days by the medical team assisting the Pope, has become necessary because of an incarcerated incisional hernia that is causing recurrent, painful and worsening subocclusive syndromes."

This is the third time that the Pope has been admitted to the Roman hospital, where he was admitted for three nights at the end of March for "acute pneumonia". He also suffers from a problem in his right knee that forces him to walk with a cane or to move in a wheelchair and has assured on several occasions that he does not want to operate.

During a press conference on his way back from a trip, he confessed that the anesthesia affected him a lot during the operation on the colon and "still has some effects." "You don't play with anesthesia and that's why you think it's not convenient," he said of that possible operation.

  • the Vatican

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