Heart by-pass means Steve will miss the festive lights show

Friday, November 21, 2008, 08:03

COMMUNITY leader Steve Povey is set to undergo an eight hour operation in a bid to cure problems with his heart.

The councillor will have a triple by-pass at a specialist heart hospital in Manchester on Friday.

Steve, aged 50, was first admitted to hospital with heart problems in March this year.

It was discovered that he had suffered three heart attacks and he underwent an emergency operation which involved the installation of two stents.

During the same operation, a vein was also moved to open up the arteries to his heart.

Just under three weeks later he was admitted to hospital again, suffering from breathing problems.

He was told by doctors that he had got an infection on one of his lungs. They did a scan and found blood clots.

He was in hospital for a week where doctors put him on morphine and blood-thinning medicine.

Steve, who is a member of both the town and district councils, admitted that he had been feeling tired again over the past month.

Two weeks ago, he was asked to go to hospital for some tests and was kept in for six days.

He said: "The doctors had to carry out a lot more tests on me than they first thought.

"Now, I am to have this by-pass operation, which is to take around eight hours.

"I am hoping that once this is done, it will put me back to the way I was before."

It means that Steve, who has played a big part in organising the town's Christmas lights switch-on for the past 27 years, will not be at the event on Friday.

The oatcake businessman said: "I am upset that I am not going to be able to be at the switch-on event but I am leaving it in good hands with town centre co-ordinator Mike Cozens and Leek Town Clerk Julie Taylor."

Mr Cozens said: "Steve will be missed because besides being heavily involved in organising the event, he is always out there on the night helping to deliver it.

"It will be a challenge to maintain our usual standards and we will be thinking of him on the night."

Steve is always looking at ways to help others and he has decided to organise a competition relating to his surgery on Friday. He is asking people to guess how many stitches he will have after the operation.

He said: "Apparently, when you have an operation like this, the doctors cut you from the belly button up to the neck.

"I thought if people paid to have a guess, then the money raised can go to the Zipper Club, which is a charity for heart diseases."

Anyone wishing to have a guess can pop into the Leek Town Clerk's Office on Stockwell Street and pay £5 to have a go.

Although Steve will miss the Friday night light's switch on, he has targeted the live nativity event in the town centre, on December 12, for a return to public life.

He said: "I will definitely be there for the nativity event."