Two weeks ago I mentioned that I had been invited to have an abdominal aortic aneurysm screening:
The purpose, I was told, was to 'help find an aneurysm' in the main blood vessel that supplies blood to the body.
What they were looking for was any swelling – which can be serious – but they couldn't find anything so I passed that test and we move on.
Yesterday I received an email from an old friend telling recipients that he is due to have open heart surgery before Christmas to repair an aneurysm.
I have known him since university. We met at a cheese and wine party (!) in our first week at Aberdeen in 1976 and have remained good friends ever since, although it’s a few years since I last saw him.
The irony is that I have always thought of him as much fitter than I have ever been.
He has never been overweight and has always looked after himself, so news of his impending operation adds fuel to my belief that, while it’s sensible to take precautions to lower the risks in later years, there is a Russian roulette aspect to health that limits what we can do.
Perhaps it’s hereditary or just bad luck, but some things are beyond our control.
My father, for example, was never overweight and enjoyed far more exercise as an adult than I ever have, yet he suffered heart problems from his early fifties and ended up having two heart by-pass operations and a heart transplant.
According to my mother - and this was news to me until yesterday - he also had aortic aneurysm surgery.
My grandfather died of angina in 1972 before heart by-passes were common procedure, so perhaps my father inherited some of his problems from his father.
The good news is that my friend’s issue has been identified - perhaps through a similar screening to the one I had last month - and is being dealt with.
I wish him all the very best.