Eric Church Could Have Died Due to a Blood Clot Caused by a Birth Defect
Country singer, Eric Church, is up for Entertainer of the Year at the 2022 Academy of Country Music Awards, but he almost didn’t make it this far. In 2017, he found out he’d developed a blood clot that could have killed him at any moment. And he had to go to three different hospitals for doctors to properly treat it.
Eric Church found his arm was ‘noticeably red and enlarged’ in 2017
When Church first started developing symptoms, he said he didn’t think much of them. “I just associated it with nerves,” he told Rolling Stone. “I didn’t think it was anything.”
But in 2017, while “watching the College World Series and texting about golf,” he noticed his left hand “was not responding like it should.”
After that, he began to think his arm was swollen and when he pulled back his shirt found it was “noticeably red and enlarged.” He Googled “thrombosis of the arm” and found he had “five out of five” symptoms. So, he drove himself to the local hospital in North Carolina where he lives since his wife, Katherine, was out of town.
Eric Church had a blood clot in his chest and needed immediate surgery
After being referred to a second hospital for an ultrasound, Church was informed he had a blood clot in his chest and would need immediate surgery. He told Rolling Stone he asked, “Can it kill me?” and the doctor answered, “Today.”
His state was so critical he couldn’t travel by helicopter to Duke University Hospital for surgery. The clot could have dislodged and killed him due to the vibrations and pressure during the ride. So, he went in the back of an ambulance after receiving blood thinners.
According to Church, he expected he would go to surgery in the morning after he arrived at Duke. But medical staff was waiting to get him into the operating room as soon as he got there. “That was really when it hit me,” he told Rolling Stone. “To them, I was going to die.”
Eric Church had a birth defect most people don’t know about until ‘they just fall over in the shower’
As Church would later find out, he had a birth defect which caused his condition, called “thoracic outlet syndrome,” he told Rolling Stone. His top rib was too close to his collarbone and damaged a major vein. As a result, a clot formed and continued to build up.
Church concluded he was lucky to be alive, especially for someone his age. He said the defect is normally detected and corrected earlier in “athletic” people. But those beyond their twenties sometimes find out they’ve formed blood clots in a different way. “They just fall over in the shower,” he said.
After Church recovered from emergency surgery, doctors removed his top rib and he was able to hit the road again after rehab and physical therapy. “I can still play guitar,” Church said. “And I play golf better than ever.”
In 2020, he received the honor of Entertainer of the Year at the Country Music Association Awards. In 2022, he’s up for Entertainer of the Year against Luke Combs, Miranda Lambert, Chris Stapleton, and Carrie Underwood at the ACM Awards.
