Arroyo getting worse, doctors say

Pampanga Representative Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo INQUIRER FILE PHOTO

MANILA, Philippines—The health condition of former President and Pampanga Rep. Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo continues to deteriorate because of recurrent dysphagia, or difficulty in swallowing solid food, her doctors said.

In a March 5 medical update, Arroyo’s doctors at the Veterans Memorial Medical Center (VMMC) reported that the detained former leader continues to lose weight because of poor appetite.

The medical bulletin, signed by Dr. Martha Nucum, the chief of the VMMC’s Medical Professional Staff who heads Arroyo’s medical team, was submitted last Monday to the Sandiganbayan 1st Division by defense lawyer Modesto Ticman.

Arroyo has been confined at the VMMC where she has been on hospital arrest on plunder charges following three major cervical spine operations at the St. Luke’s Medical Center in October 2011.

Her present diagnosis is “cervical spondylotic radiculopathy, degenerative lumbar spine disease, and postcervical spine decompression with instrumentation.”—Cynthia D. Balana