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George W. Bush now home after heart procedure

Former President George W. Bush has been discharged from a Dallas hospital a day after having a heart procedure to ease a blocked artery.

Spokesman Freddy Ford says the 43rd president is “doing great” and went home Wednesday morning. Further details weren’t released.

Doctors at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital on Tuesday inserted a stent to help prop open an artery. The blockage was discovered Monday during Bush’s annual physical at a clinic in Dallas, where he lives.

Ford says the 67-year-old former president is expected to resume his normal schedule by Thursday.

Bush was described as being “in high spirits” after the procedure.

“He is grateful to the skilled medical professionals who have cared for him,” Ford said. “He thanks his family, friends, and fellow citizens for their prayers and well wishes. And he encourages us all to get our regular checkups.”

Stents are mesh scaffoldings that prop open arteries typically clogged by years of quiet cholesterol buildup. About half a million people have stents inserted in the U.S. each year, generally involving an overnight stay in the hospital.

Doctors usually guide a narrow tube through a blood vessel near the groin up to the heart, inflate a tiny balloon to flatten the blockage and insert the stent. Sometimes, they insert it through an artery in the wrist to lower the risk of bleeding.

Doctors often recommend first trying medication to treat a clogged artery. More severe blockages, particularly in several arteries, may require bypass surgery. Arteries can reclog, so patients often are put on heart-friendly diets or medication.

White House press secretary Jay Carney told reporters that President Barack Obama was briefed on Bush’s procedure and “obviously wishes him well.” He didn’t believe Obama and Bush had spoken, Carney said.

Bush is known as a fitness buff. In 1993, before he was elected Texas governor, he ran the Houston Marathon in a respectable 3:44.52.

While in the White House, he frequently used a quarter-mile jogging path on the south lawn. Bush was known to run about three miles four days a week, and cross-trained with swimming, free weights and an elliptical trainer. When doctors found his knees were getting damaged, he turned to mountain biking.

Since leaving office, Bush hosts and leads an annual 100-kilometer mountain bike ride with about 20 wounded military veterans. This year’s ride was near Waco and his Central Texas ranch. He’s also led a group of vets on bikes similarly through Texas’ rugged Big Bend National Park.

But while Bush doesn’t have a history of heart trouble, he has needed medical attention several times.

In May 2004, toward the end of his first term, Bush fell from his mountain bike during a 17-mile ride. He was wearing a helmet and mouthguard but sustained scrapes and scratches to his face, hand and knees. In July 2005, he crashed his bike again while on a slick pavement in Scotland and suffered some bruises and scrapes to a hand and arm.

In 2002, he briefly lost consciousness while watching a football game on TV at the White House and hit his head. The incident was blamed on him not feeling well and an improperly eaten pretzel.

In 1998 and 1999, while governor of Texas, he had two benign colonic polyps removed. In 2002, while president, he had a follow-up colonoscopy and invoked a section of the 25th Amendment temporarily transferring presidential powers to Vice President Dick Cheney. The colonoscopy showed no signs of cancer.

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