Jim Smeal/WireImage.com
Some more bad news for Zsa Zsa Gabor: After a
New Year's celebration filled with champagne and caviar, the veteran
diva returned to the hospital on Sunday to have the lower part of her
right leg amputated.
The 93-year-old was rushed by ambulance to Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center after doctors ordered the surgery.
"She wanted to stay home and have a holiday. They wanted to do this
before the holiday, but now the doctors have forced us," the actress's
husband, Prince Frédéric von Anhalt, told People.
What exactly went so wrong?
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Gabor, who has been in poor health since suffering complications
from hip surgery over the summer, had recently developed a lesion on her
swollen leg. The wound, which did not respond to treatment, had quickly
grown from just over an inch to nearly a foot in length.
"Doctors had wanted to operate on it for several days," said Gabor's
spokesman, John Blanchette, but the actress wanted to first spend New
Year's at home with von Anhalt.
"Frédéric and Zsa Zsa asked if they could spend New Year's at home,
and [they] shared champagne and caviar. The doctors came to the house
[Sunday], and when they unwrapped the bandages, the wound had festered
and they were afraid of gangrene developing, which would be
life-threatening," Blanchette said.
She was then taken to the hospital and prepped for surgery in the early evening.
"It's a dangerous operation, but the upside is that, if successful,
she will remain her same old feisty self for a few more years,"
Blanchette said.
The Hungarian actress has been confined to a wheelchair since a 2002
car accident. Three years later, in 2005, she suffered a stroke, and has
since experienced more health problems.
Before this latest emergency, Gabor had fallen out of bed and broken several bones. She was sent home a month later this past August but two days later was rushed back and even read her last rites by a priest.
