PRESIDENT Ivan Gašparovič underwent hip surgery on February 14. The operation was a standard procedure without any complications.
“After surgery the president smiled and claimed he had no pain,” Juraj Šimko, the head of the trauma surgery department at Ladislav Dérer University Hospital in Bratislava, told the SITA newswire.
The operation took 68 minutes and the head of state woke up 10 minutes after the procedure was completed. Gašparovič was expected to remain in hospital for a week, SITA reported.
In January, his spokesperson Marek Trubač said that the president had experienced hip problems for several years. This was the reason why he gave up sport, but he has said he would be happy to start playing tennis again after the surgery.