***** Cheney treated for blood clot in leg
By James Gerstenzang
Times Staff Writer
2:14 PM PST, March 5, 2007
WASHINGTON - Vice President ***** Cheney, who returned to Washington last
week from an around-the-world trip, is being treated for a blood clot in his
left leg, his office announced today. Such clots, while rare, are sometimes
caused by extended air travel.
Cheney is being treated with a blood thinner intended to prevent the clot
from breaking loose and reaching his lungs, said his deputy press secretary,
Megan McGinn. She said Cheney, 66, had experienced "mild calf discomfort."
Cheney has been treated for multiple cardiology and vascular issues over the
past three decades -- most recently undergoing surgery in September, 2005,
to treat swelling in blood vessels behind both knees. He has had four heart
attacks, quadruple bypass surgery, two artery-clearing angioplasty
procedures, and an operation to implant a pacemaker, designed to start
automatically to regulate his heartbeat if needed.
He has struggled for years to keep his weight down and has traveled with an
exercise cycle stored in the cargo hold of Air Force Two.
The vice president's most recent travel took him to Japan, Australia, Oman,
Pakistan and Afghanistan, a roughly 25,000-mile trip over the course of a
week.
"In light of his recent prolonged air travel, he visited his doctor's office
at the George Washington University Medical Faculty Associates," she said.
An ultrasound revealed the clot, a deep venous thrombosis, or DVT, in his
left lower leg, she said.
Cheney would be treated with the blood thinner for several months, McGinn
said. The vice president's office did not make public the specific
medication with which he is being treated.
McGinn said Cheney, who spoke for about 20 minutes during the morning to a
convention of the Veterans of Foreign Wars, returned to his White House
office after visiting the medical office.
Obesity, immobility and age are among the risk factors for deep venous
thrombosis, said Leslie Saxon, chief of cardiology at the Keck School of
Medicine at USC.
The factors can be multiplied by air travel, Saxon said, because the lower
oxygen levels in airplanes lower the oxygen in the bloodstream, increasing
the risk of clots, and the dry air of the airplane increases dehydration,
another factor in increasing the likelihood of clotting.
In addition, she said, "people who have heart and circulation problems don't
have as vigorous a flow" of blood as healthier people.
She said the common blood thinner treatment carried some risk of promoting
internal bleeding but that the risk was "extraordinarily low
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