Vatican: pope's wrist healing well

(July 27, 2009) Doctors examined Pope Benedict XVI's broken wrist at the pontiff's Alpine vacation cottage on Saturday and were pleased with the healing process, Vatican spokesman Fr. Federico Lombardi said. During the half-hour check-up, the cast on the fractured right wrist was removed and a new one put on, the Jesuit priest said in a statement. The 82-year-old pope had surgery at the hospital on July 17 on his right wrist, which he fractured in a fall in his cottage earlier that day. Doctors from Aosta hospital as well as Vatican doctors carried out medical and radiological exams near the Pope’s cottage, which is run by the Salesians of Don Bosco. Vatican CTV television captured some of the pope's chatting with his doctors, the Italian news agency ANSA reported from the vacation retreat. Among the doctors involved in Saturday's check-up was a Vatican clinic’s orthopaedist, Dr, Vincenzo Sezza, who will continue the Pope's care when he returns to Castel Gandolfo, the papal summer residence near Rome, as well as when he is back in the Vatican, Fr. Lombardi said.