US President Donald Trump’s health has shown ‘ups and downs’, but is now in a better condition than it was on Friday when he was hospitalised, the doctors said on Sunday, 4 October.
Trump has been hospitalised at the Walter Reed Medical Centre since Friday, 2 October after he tested positive for COVID-19.
In a press briefing, Dr Sean Conley said he is “continuing to improve” but, as with any illness, “there are frequent ups and downs”.
“Late Friday morning when I returned to the bedside, the President had a high fever and his oxygen saturation was transiently dipping below 94%,” Conley said. He further said the President was given supplemental oxygen and his current blood oxygen level is 98%.
“Over the course of his illness, the President has experienced two episodes of transient drops in his oxygen saturation. We debated the reasons for this, and whether we'd even intervene. It was a determination of the team, based on the timeline from the initial diagnosis, that we initiated dexamethasone,” Conley said.
Dexamethasone is a widely available steroid drug.
Asked repeatedly at the press briefing, Dr Conley did not address how low the President's blood oxygen levels had dropped. When asked if they had dropped below 90, he replied, “We don't have any recordings here of that.”
On Trump's medical team, Dr Brian Garibaldi said that the President could be discharged as early as Monday. “He has been up and around. Our plan today is to have him eat and drink, be up out of bed,” Garibaldi said.
“If he continues to look and feel as well as he does today, our hope is to plan for a discharge as early as tomorrow to the White House where he can continue his treatment course,” he said.
Reacting to the press announcement by Trump's medical team, Dr Sanjay Gupta, a neurosurgeon told CNN that “it sounds like there is a very significant level of concern right now.”
“Call it an abundance of caution, he has received three different (serious and experimental) medications, he's dropped his oxygenation level low,” Dr Gupta explained, reasoning why he does not believe Trump should be discharged tomorrow.
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