PM taken off ventilator, say doctors

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who underwent a successful coronary by-pass surgery to overcome multiple blockages to his heart, is doing fine, has been taken off the ventilator and put on liquid diet, doctors attending to him said on Sunday.
    
The 76-year-old Prime Minister "is doing fine now. He is conscious. He also met his family and congratulated all the
doctors," Dr Ramakant Panda, a specialist of Mumbai's Asian Heart Institute, who led the team of doctors during the surgery at AIIMS, told PTI.
    
Satisfied with his "improving condition", doctors earlier withdrew the ventilator support to Singh, he said. "The ventilator has been taken off and he is breathing on his own. This is an important step," Panda said.
    
Dr Vijay D'Silva, who attended to the Prime Minister throughout the night, said that Singh has been given liquid diet since morning and was speaking to doctors. The Prime Minister also had a cup of tea in the morning, he said."The way you (doctors) are taking care of me, you should take care of other people also," D'Silva quoted Singh as saying.
    
D'Silva, an Intensive Care Unit specialist, said the Prime Minister was in a "happy mood" and was "happy with his treatment".

A PMO statement said Singh had an "uneventful night" following his surgery. "Doctors attending on the PM say that he is stable, comfortable and is making rapid progress," it said.
   
Panda, who is a specialist in 're-do by-pass' surgery, said, "We are monitoring the important parameters like his
pulse, blood pressure, temperature and urine output.
   
"We have also tried to find out the pressure in the lungs through a tube called Swanganz. We are also ensuring that
there is no post-operative bleeding and we have found that bleeding has stopped," he said.
    
The Prime Minister is expected to be in the ICU for three days and spend about seven to eight days in the hospital.
    
The 11-member team from the AHI, Mumbai, had yesterday performed the over 11-hour-long operation on the Prime Minister. The team included three more doctors and a large number of support staff.