Pope recovering normally, shows closeness to hospitalized children

Vatican News staff writer

Pope Francis is recovering well after intestinal surgery he underwent on Sunday at Rome's Gemelli Hospital, Matteo Bruni, the director of the Holy See Press office, said in his update on the Pope on Thursday.  It was a “quiet day for the Pope” and his chest-abdomen CT scan was negative

“His Holiness Pope Francis spent a quiet day, eating and moving around independently on his own,” Bruni said.  “In the afternoon he wanted to show his paternal closeness to the little patients of the nearby Pediatric Oncology and Child Neurosurgery ward, sending them his affectionate greeting."

However, Bruni said that the Pope had a slight fever Wednesday evening.  Thursday morning, the Holy Father  "underwent routine microbiological tests and a chest-abdomen CT scan, which was negative".

The director of the Holy See Press Office said, “The Holy Father continues the planned treatments and oral feeding.” “At this particular moment, he turns his gaze to those who suffer, expressing his closeness to the sick, especially to those most in need of care," Bruni added.

In the afternoon on July 4, Pope Francis left the Vatican’s Casa Santa Marta for Rome's Agostino Gemelli Polyclinic, a Catholic hospital, where in the evening he underwent a “scheduled surgery for symptomatic diverticular stenosis of the colon”. "Stenosis" is constriction of the intestine due to the “diverticula”, or pouches or sacs, that form on the wall of the large intestine narrowing the passage.  Following the operation Sunday evening, Bruni said the Holy Father reacted well to the surgery which was performed under general anaesthesia.