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American Morning

Paging Dr. Gupta: Johnny Cash, John Ritter Dead

Aired September 12, 2003 - 07:32   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: Johnny Cash was 71 years old. He had been seriously ill and died earlier today from complications of diabetes, just a day after being released from a hospital in Nashville, Tennessee. John Ritter, though, was only 54. His death last night in Los Angeles was sudden and it was surprising. He became ill yesterday while working on the set of his ABC sitcom, "Eight Simple Rules for Dating My Teenage Daughter." He's reported to have died from an undetected heart condition.
Dr. Sanjay Gupta here to explain what this may have been yesterday in Los Angeles.

A dissection of the aorta, what does that mean to you?

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, a dissection of the aorta, the aorta is the largest blood vessel that's leaving the heart. And while this is not a very common condition, certainly a lot less common than a heart attack -- a lot of people know that condition -- this is actually a little bit different than that. One of the major blood vessels now leaving the heart, it can actually dissect -- think about this sort of as a big tube and there can become a little hole in the tube so blood actually starts to dissect within that hole.

Take a look at some pictures now. The aorta goes through the chest and then down into the abdomen. It sounds like, from what we're hearing now, he had sudden pain and symptoms that sometimes look like a heart attack and can actually be that, where it goes through the chest, the aorta actually dissecting open. There you go, get a better look at it now.

See that, Bill? It's like a tube and blood actually gets in between the layers of that tube and you can get massive bleeding into that. You can actually bleed out all of your blood into this specific layer, and essentially it's significant bleeding that occurs within the body but is still, you know, can cause death.

Now, the heart -- when the heart is not pumping enough blood, obviously the heart fails, as well. So, in fact, he probably ultimately died because his heart failed, but because of this bleeding into the aorta.

HEMMER: Why do they say it's unrecognized? Can you detect it or not?

GUPTA: Well, it's sort of interesting, a good portion of these are congenital, meaning that he may have had this entire life. A good percentage of them are also worsened by hypertension, things like that. It's a very significant bleed when it does occur. Fifty percent of the people who have a rupture like this do die before they even make it to the hospital. Of the people who survive, about half of those have significant complications afterwards with their kidneys, sometimes paralysis, all sorts of things. So it can be a devastating bleed.

But, yes, it's something that you could have your entire life, even, and not really know about it.

HEMMER: Clarify something. On the screen it says he died of a heart attack, but in your first answer you say it's not necessarily the case that it was a heart attack.

GUPTA: That's right. That's right. You know, when you really look at why a lot of deaths occur, ultimately it's because the heart fails. You know, when the doctor actually determines death, it's because they no longer detect a heartbeat, which is probably what happened with him, as well. But why did the heart stop failing? Because he had massive bleeding into his aorta, which is a major blood vessel leaving the heart

It's important to make that distinction because if someone died of a heart attack, it usually means that they had heart problems specifically. It doesn't sound that necessarily that's what Mr. Ritter had. Instead, he had a problem with this large blood vessel that leaves the heart. And, you know, obviously, post-mortem it's not as important, but an important distinction as far as causes go.

HEMMER: I want to talk about what happened with Johnny Cash here in Nashville, Tennessee. He was in the hospital at least on September 10 of this week, died a day and a half later, complications with diabetes, we are told, and a long-term history of a number of illnesses for Johnny Cash.

GUPTA: Yes, you know, he's been sick for a long time. We've certainly been following that along. You know, it's interesting, he was admitted for stomach ailments. Oftentimes that's related to an ulcer in the stomach that may be bleeding or something like that. When someone has diabetes, there's a whole host of problems that they sort of open themselves up to. One of the major ones now being infection, as well as problems with the heart, again, as well.

What he -- what we're being told that he died of is actually respiratory failure or lung failure. What happens in that situation, Bill, oftentimes there can be a massive infection of the lung and you just really can't get enough oxygen into the rest of your body. And that can be a pretty quick and sudden death.

HEMMER: And we all know how much he suffered when his wife passed away in May of this past year.

GUPTA: Yes, June Carter passed, right.

HEMMER: Thank you, Sanjay.

We'll talk a bit later today. GUPTA: OK. All right.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com






Aired September 12, 2003 - 07:32   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: Johnny Cash was 71 years old. He had been seriously ill and died earlier today from complications of diabetes, just a day after being released from a hospital in Nashville, Tennessee. John Ritter, though, was only 54. His death last night in Los Angeles was sudden and it was surprising. He became ill yesterday while working on the set of his ABC sitcom, "Eight Simple Rules for Dating My Teenage Daughter." He's reported to have died from an undetected heart condition.
Dr. Sanjay Gupta here to explain what this may have been yesterday in Los Angeles.

A dissection of the aorta, what does that mean to you?

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, a dissection of the aorta, the aorta is the largest blood vessel that's leaving the heart. And while this is not a very common condition, certainly a lot less common than a heart attack -- a lot of people know that condition -- this is actually a little bit different than that. One of the major blood vessels now leaving the heart, it can actually dissect -- think about this sort of as a big tube and there can become a little hole in the tube so blood actually starts to dissect within that hole.

Take a look at some pictures now. The aorta goes through the chest and then down into the abdomen. It sounds like, from what we're hearing now, he had sudden pain and symptoms that sometimes look like a heart attack and can actually be that, where it goes through the chest, the aorta actually dissecting open. There you go, get a better look at it now.

See that, Bill? It's like a tube and blood actually gets in between the layers of that tube and you can get massive bleeding into that. You can actually bleed out all of your blood into this specific layer, and essentially it's significant bleeding that occurs within the body but is still, you know, can cause death.

Now, the heart -- when the heart is not pumping enough blood, obviously the heart fails, as well. So, in fact, he probably ultimately died because his heart failed, but because of this bleeding into the aorta.

HEMMER: Why do they say it's unrecognized? Can you detect it or not?

GUPTA: Well, it's sort of interesting, a good portion of these are congenital, meaning that he may have had this entire life. A good percentage of them are also worsened by hypertension, things like that. It's a very significant bleed when it does occur. Fifty percent of the people who have a rupture like this do die before they even make it to the hospital. Of the people who survive, about half of those have significant complications afterwards with their kidneys, sometimes paralysis, all sorts of things. So it can be a devastating bleed.

But, yes, it's something that you could have your entire life, even, and not really know about it.

HEMMER: Clarify something. On the screen it says he died of a heart attack, but in your first answer you say it's not necessarily the case that it was a heart attack.

GUPTA: That's right. That's right. You know, when you really look at why a lot of deaths occur, ultimately it's because the heart fails. You know, when the doctor actually determines death, it's because they no longer detect a heartbeat, which is probably what happened with him, as well. But why did the heart stop failing? Because he had massive bleeding into his aorta, which is a major blood vessel leaving the heart

It's important to make that distinction because if someone died of a heart attack, it usually means that they had heart problems specifically. It doesn't sound that necessarily that's what Mr. Ritter had. Instead, he had a problem with this large blood vessel that leaves the heart. And, you know, obviously, post-mortem it's not as important, but an important distinction as far as causes go.

HEMMER: I want to talk about what happened with Johnny Cash here in Nashville, Tennessee. He was in the hospital at least on September 10 of this week, died a day and a half later, complications with diabetes, we are told, and a long-term history of a number of illnesses for Johnny Cash.

GUPTA: Yes, you know, he's been sick for a long time. We've certainly been following that along. You know, it's interesting, he was admitted for stomach ailments. Oftentimes that's related to an ulcer in the stomach that may be bleeding or something like that. When someone has diabetes, there's a whole host of problems that they sort of open themselves up to. One of the major ones now being infection, as well as problems with the heart, again, as well.

What he -- what we're being told that he died of is actually respiratory failure or lung failure. What happens in that situation, Bill, oftentimes there can be a massive infection of the lung and you just really can't get enough oxygen into the rest of your body. And that can be a pretty quick and sudden death.

HEMMER: And we all know how much he suffered when his wife passed away in May of this past year.

GUPTA: Yes, June Carter passed, right.

HEMMER: Thank you, Sanjay.

We'll talk a bit later today. GUPTA: OK. All right.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com