Brazil’s president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, will undergo another operation to “minimize the risk of future bleeding” his doctors have said, after the emergency operation carried out on Tuesday to contain a brain bleed.
Lula, 79, is expected to undergo the “complementary” procedure on Thursday , his medical team said on Wednesday.
The minimally invasive procedure is called middle meningeal artery embolization and aims to reduce bleeding and prevent the accumulation of blood between the brain and the skull.
“There is a small possibility that in the future, the small arteries of the meninges could still cause minor bleeding,” Lula’s personal doctor, Dr Roberto Kalil Filho told reporters. “So this complementary procedure to the surgical procedure is to minimise the risk of this happening in the future.”
Kalil said that the “relatively simple and low risk”, non-surgery procedure would be carried out on Thursday morning and would take about an hour.
Kalil reiterated that the president’s first surgery had been carried out without complications and said that the president’s recovery has been “excellent”.
“He is doing well, sitting up, talking and eating,” he said.
Lula’s medical team said the president was “alert and engaged” and had spent the day undergoing physiotherapy and receiving visits from family members.
The leftist leader was admitted to the Sírio-Libanês hospital in São Paulo on Monday night in Brasília after complaining of a headache. After an MRI, doctors discovered a hematoma which resulted from an accident nearly two months ago.
The president was trimming his toenails in the bathroom of the official residence on October 19, when he fell and hit his head. He was taken to the hospital, received five stitches, and was discharged, but as a precaution, doctors barred him from travelling to a Brics summit in Russia.
On Monday, he was transferred to the hospital in São Paulo, where doctors carried out a trepanation, in which a small hole was made in the skull to drain the bleeding and reduce pressure.
During Tuesday’s press conference, Lula’s personal doctor repeatedly emphasised that the president “suffered no brain injury and has no neurological impairment” or aftereffects.
