Pope Francis died at one point in a close distance during his 38-day battle with pneumonia, so close that his doctors believed treatment was over so that he could die peacefully.
After the February 28 breathing crisis, Francis almost vomited his vomit, “He probably won’t be at real risk.”
“We have to choose whether we will stop there, let him go, or move on and push forward all drugs and therapies, taking the highest risk of harming his other organs,” Alfieri told Italy’s Corriere Delle Della Sera in an interview posted on Tuesday.
“In the end, we went this path,” he said.
Francis, 88, returned to the Vatican on Sunday after his 12-year-old Pope’s worst health crisis.
He was taken to Gemelli Hospital on February 14 and developed into bipneumonia due to an onset of bronchitis, which was particularly severe for him, because he had pleurisy when he was young and had part of his lungs removed.
Credit Pope’s Nurse
The Vatican provides unusual details in its daily updates during its hospital period, including four “respiratory crises” involving severe coughs caused by its airway contraction, similar to an asthma attack.
Alfieri had previously said that two of the crises were crucial, putting Francis “at life threatening.” In a new interview, the doctor said he was the Pope’s personal nurse and instructed the medical team to continue receiving treatment after the episode of vomiting.
“Try everything; don’t give up,” message from Pope Nurse Massimiliano Strappetti, as Alfieri said.
“For a few days, we risked damage to his kidney and bone marrow, but we kept moving forward and his body responded less to the medication,” Alfiri said.
Francis has been resting for another two months since he left the hospital for full recovery. It is unclear how much he will be seen in public in the coming weeks.
Francis, who appeared on the hospital balcony on Sunday, said hello, narrating the pope’s first public appearance, which Alfieri said was a moment of the pope’s treatment, shocking him.
“I saw him leaving the room on the 10th floor of Gemelli, dressed in white,” the doctor said. “It was the emotion of seeing a man become a pope again.”
