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Spies could die playing rugby

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Caledfwlch

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http://planetrugby.com/Story/0,18259,3551_2635084,00.html



Springbok loose forward Pierre Spies may never play rugby again, after it has been revealed that his withdrawal from the World Cup squad was because he could be suffering from the same rare blood disease that killed his father and grandfather.

Spies was diagnosed with pulmonary embolism (blood clots in the lungs) and withdrew from the South African team on Monday.

The initial prognoses was that he would be sidelined for at least six to eight months.

However, it has now been revealed that the cause could be a hereditary genetic condition.

Pierre Spies senior, a champion hurdler and a star winger for Northern Transvaal (now Blue Bulls) in the 1970s, died of a heart attack at age 54.

Spies junior's aunt also has the rare blood condition, while his grandfather also died of a related illness.

The condition, in layman's terms, means that Spies's blood is thicker than that of the average person.

If his blood clots and goes into his brain, it could result in a stroke. If the clot goes into his heart he will have a heart attack.

If the young Bok loose forward's condition is indeed hereditary, Spies may have to take blood-thinning medicine for the rest of his life, ruling out all contact sport.

It was only after Spies started coughing up blood during training that it came to light that he may have the condition.

Scans showed he had clots on both lungs.



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so much for spies being the no 1 8 man in the world. he might not EVER play rugby again. i think we can strike him off the best 8 man discussion
 
Poor fellow :( I was really looking forward to seeing him play more. Oh well, as you said Caledfwlch, we can strike him of the best loosies or number 8 discussion.

Good luck to him.
 
damn thats serious as! he should drink millions of gallons of water!

he's pretty young still aye such a shame really
 
awww hes the man he kicked 2 pens in rugby 08 for me poor guy..... lol

30 secs
 
Thats awful. I think we're all pretty gutted about this and I hope he pulls through.
 
damn thats serious as! he should drink millions of gallons of water!

he's pretty young still aye such a shame really [/b]

Aspirin or Warfrin(?) would help too....still not worththe risk though. How horrible for him. Hope they can help him. He must be gutted.
 
Hope he gets to play again. Hopefully medical science can do something. What a time to find out! I bet he's wishing that it'd all happened 12 months further down the line and that he'd at least had a shot at the World Cup.

This will be absolutely gutting for him.
 
damn it! who changed he topic ***le! i was so proud of my typo and spelling error!
 
pity indeed - hopefully he can recover and resume his career - if not the Boks have lost out on a lot of mobility in the back row, great player who was just beginning to make an impression at the international level.
 
ahh that's bad news. bad luck for pierre and the boks but if not playing rugby means an extended life then you gotta do what you gotta do
 
Truley is bad news, hopefully he can recover and im sure everyone wishes him all of the best.
 
This is a big blow for SA and international rugby.
He started out on wing -> Lomu style and does the 100m in under 11.
For someone his size and mobility, he defnitly would have made a big impact...
 
Oh man... Losing him will be a blow to SA, that's for sure.

I hope he pulls through and saves his career.
 

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