President Donald Trump is taking more aspirin than his doctors have recommended. And if he had it to do over, he would have skipped the advanced imaging that fueled days of headlines about his health.
“In retrospect, it’s too bad I took it because it gave them a little ammunition,” Trump, who at 79 is the oldest man to assume the presidency, told The Wall Street Journal in a wide-ranging interview about his health.
“I would have been a lot better off if they didn’t, because the fact that I took it said, ‘Oh gee, is something wrong?’ Well, nothing’s wrong,” the Republican president told the newspaper.
Trump has said that he had an MRI at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in October, the newspaper reported. When he was asked about the procedure by The Journal, Trump and his doctor said he underwent a CT scan.
Trump has relied on what he has described as his “good genetics” instead of following the medical community’s widely accepted health recommendations, the newspaper reported.
Trump’s doctors have urged him to reduce his aspirin intake, which has contributed to his bruising. Trump has opted against switching because he has followed the regimen for 25 years.
“I’m a little superstitious,” he told The Journal.
“They say aspirin is good for thinning out the blood, and I don’t want thick blood pouring through my heart,” Trump told the newspaper. “I want nice, thin blood pouring through my heart. Does that make sense?”