By Trevor Hunnicutt and Steve Holland
WASHINGTON, June 2 (Reuters) – A physician in Donald Trump’s administration brushed off questions about the U.S. president’s personal health on Tuesday, describing the 79-year-old’s third physical examination in 13 months as routine and the results as “spectacular.”
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Trump’s visit to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center last week had drawn attention after he was seen at public events with swollen ankles, bruised hands and at times appearing to nod off. Details of his exam were scarce.
“It’s just a routine, regular exam,” Mehmet Oz, administrator of the U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, said at a White House briefing. “If you look at these records, they’re spectacular.”
The White House released a three-page memo late on Friday from Trump’s physician, Sean Barbabella, that noted “slight lower leg swelling” and “benign” hand bruising but described the president’s overall health as “excellent.”
Barbabella has not taken questions about his examinations of the president. Some medical analysts raised questions about the frequency of Trump’s exams, the reasons behind the imaging of his heart and the cause of the hand bruising.
Oz, a celebrity physician, fielded questions on the topic as he stood in for Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, who is on maternity leave.
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Asked why the president had made repeated visits to the doctor, Oz said: “I think he likes the results.”
Trump, who turns 80 on June 14, frequently casts himself as more fit than Joe Biden, his Democratic predecessor, who left office last year at age 82 after facing questions about his fitness for the job.
Oz said his own experience with the president suggested Trump was in good shape.
“That amount of energy and that amount of mental acuity does not exist in a vacuum; you have to have a vessel to carry it, and the president has unique abilities just to keep going at all hours of the day with remarkable strength,” he said.
(Reporting by Trevor Hunnicutt and Steve Holland; Editing by Colleen Jenkins and Howard Goller)
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