Former New Zealand all-rounder Chris Cairns said on Saturday that he has been diagnosed with bowel cancer, five months after suffering a spinal stroke following emergency heart surgery.
Cairns was discharged last week after 141 days of inpatient treatment at the University of Canberra Hospital and was told about his latest health setback on Friday following a routine check.
“Another fight ahead but here’s hoping this one is a swift upper cut and over in the first round,” the 51-year-old, one of the world’s top all-rounders in the early 2000s, said on social media.
“I was told yesterday I have bowel cancer… big shock and not what I was expecting.
“So, as I prepare for another round of conversations with surgeons and specialists, I keep remembering how lucky I am to be here in the first place.”
The 51-year-old suffered an aortic dissection — an often fatal rare heart condition — in August and was on life support. He was saved by four open heart surgeries but he had a spinal stroke on the operating table.
The Canberra-based Cairns required urgent heart surgery last September following an aortic dissection, which is a tear in the inner layer of the body’s main artery.
During the operation he suffered a stroke which left him paralysed in both legs.
Cairns, who played 62 Tests and 215 ODIs for New Zealand between 1989 to 2006, is facing the possibility of spending the rest of his life in a wheelchair but he said he is simply “lucky to still be here”.
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