MOSCOW, November 23 (RIA Novosti) - Former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, who underwent surgery to prevent a stroke in a Munich clinic earlier in the week, could be discharged next week, the Gorbachev Foundation said Thursday.
"A patient usually spends a few days in such a clinic after such an operation, and is then discharged," Vladimir Polyakov, a spokesman for the foundation, said.
The Gorbachev Foundation is an independent socioeconomic and political think-tank that the Soviet Union's first and last president set up following his resignation.
A source from the Ludwig Maximilian University's Grosshadern neurological hospital said earlier in the day: "The 75-year-old patient, admitted to the clinic with pre-stroke symptoms Sunday, had a surgical operation on his right internal carotid artery."
"A detailed X-ray examination, carried out by inserting a contrasting device into the brain vessels, confirmed that the condition was quite serious, with the vital artery narrowed 80% by a cholesterol plaque. Such cases demand immediate surgical intervention," he said.
The carotid arteries are responsible for carrying oxygenated blood to the brain. Cholesterol plaques may narrow or clog the arteries, reducing blood flow, which can lead to a stroke.
The source said, citing an official statement by the head of the Grosshadern clinic, Professor Klaus Peter: "The operation was a success, and the patient is feeling relatively well now."
He said Gorbachev's daughter Irina, a trained doctor, is staying at her father's bedside.
The former Soviet leader, famous for his efforts to reshape East-West relations, lost his wife Raisa to leukemia in 1999.
Gorbachev had organized and was expected to attend the seventh international conference of Nobel Peace Prize winners in Rome November 17. The meeting was to focus on nuclear technologies.
But the charismatic leader chose to follow his doctors' advice and canceled the trip to undergo a medical examination, Polyakov said earlier.
