Connecticut Sen. Chris Murphy said Friday he has been discharged from the hospital after suffering a stroke last weekend and will spend several weeks at a rehabilitation facility, missing Senate votes as Congress returns to Washington next week.
Murphy, 53, said doctors diagnosed a small hemorrhagic stroke — a bleed in the thalamus region of his brain. He called 911 on Saturday, October 31, after feeling that “something was not right” with his body while attending his son’s hockey game, when he felt numbness in his left arm. He was taken to a local hospital and transferred to Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore.
“The doctors are very encouraged by the progress I’ve made so far,” Murphy said in a statement from his office. “In order to take my recovery seriously and get back to work on the quickest timeline possible, I will be spending several weeks at a rehabilitation center after being discharged from the hospital today.”
His physician, Dr. Jose Suarez, chief of neurosciences critical care at Johns Hopkins, said Murphy “has shown tremendous progress, and at the current rate of improvement, we expect that he will make a full recovery following rehabilitation.” His office first disclosed the stroke on November 1 and has not given a specific date for his return to the Capitol.
Murphy’s absence will be felt as the Senate returns Monday from a month-long recess into the final weeks of the lame-duck session, with federal funding set to expire on December 11. He said he will work remotely with his staff and colleagues while he recovers.
