Presenter Richard Madeley has spoken for the first time about wife Judy Finnigan coming close to death after she vomited a pint of blood.
The star of morning TV replayed the terrifying incident that saw Judy rushed to hospital for two blood transfusions last year.
Richard explained that if he hadn’t called an ambulance in time things could have been very different, as Judy was half an hour from death when medics arrived at their home.
Opening up, he told The Sun: “She’d been taking Ibuprofen for sore knees and she had no clue that taking them on an empty stomach could seriously affect the stomach lining.”
Judy, 71, then had to have four ulcers removed from her stomach lining, including once in her artery that caused the severe bleeding.
She also needed two blood transfusions after losing so much blood.
Richard, 63, added that it was a very scary time because it was “touch and go” for Judy at first.
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He said if he had found Judy any later, she may not have made it.
He explained: “It was touch and [bleeping] go. While she was coming round from that, the surgeon said, ‘She’s going to be fine. Did you call the ambulance immediately?’
“I said, ‘Yes,’ and he said, ‘Good, because if you’d waited another 20 minutes she probably would have bled out.’ Half an hour tops and she would have died.”
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The harrowing ordeal has now led the couple, who have been married since 1986, to give up alcohol.
Judy opened up about the near-death experience in January.
Judy said in her Express column: “Last autumn it happened to me and I nearly died.
“The culprit was good old over-the-counter ibuprofen, the seemingly harmless stuff you take for a bad back, or (in my case) a painful knee. I gulped the jolly little bright blue capsules, looking like sweeties, daily for a mere four weeks.
“I woke up and vomited copious amounts of blood. Totally out of the blue. Never experienced anything like it before and hope to God I never will again.”
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