The last minutes of his life Pope Francis described in an interview with Corriere della Sera The Coordinator doctor of his Pontifical Medical Team and his surgeon.
Dr. Sergio Alfieri, who is also the head of the Gemelli Digestive Surgery Team in Rome, revealed that Pope Francis, just two days before he died, had told him he was feeling very well.
Referring to his last meeting with Pontiff, on Good Saturday (19.04.25) after lunch, Sergio Alfieri said: “I can say it was very good, he told me. I brought him a tart as he liked and we chatted for a while.
”I am very well, I started working again and I am ready for that“, He told me. I knew that the next day he would give Urbi et Orbi and we agreed to meet on Monday.”
Ten days ago, Pope Francis had asked for a meeting with “all the people who had been careful in Gemelli”.
“I told him he was 70 people, maybe it was better to do it after Easter, after he was fully lifted. His answer was clear: ‘I’ll meet them on Wednesday’. I feel that he felt he had to do a series of things before he died, “his doctor told Corriere.
He then told what happened on Easter Monday, when Pope Francis died: “At about 5:30 am. I received a phone call from Stavi: ”The Holy Father is very ill, we must go back to Gemelli ”he told me. I warned everyone and 20 minutes later I was there in Santa Martha, but it seemed difficult to think that hospitalization was necessary. “
«I entered his room and his eyes were open. I found that he had no respiratory problems. I shouted his name, but he didn’t answer. It did not respond to stimuli, even painful. At that moment I realized that I could do nothing else. Was in a coma“, He described.
As the doctor explained, the transfer to the hospital would be useless. “We would risk dying in the transfer and explained that hospital hospitalization would be useless. Strapeti knew that the Pope wanted to die at home, always saying it while he was hospitalized in Gemelli. Died a little later.
I stayed there with Massimilian, Andrea, the other nurses and the secretaries – everyone arrived and Cardinal Paroline asked us to pray. I felt privileged and I can now say I was. That morning I gave him a caress as the last goodbye. “
The surgeon subsequently pointed out the “secret” interventions in which Pontius underwent.
“I was a consultant surgeon at the Holy See and invited us to attend a function in Santa Mata. He was like a parish priest, he made the preaching and in the end he came out of the church and greet everyone, one by one. Two years later he began to feel sick in the stomach, had very strong abdominal pain and his quality of life, with all his professional obligations, was not the best. “
Diagnosis was a severe diverticulitis. “One day the station that brought the computed tomography. Perhaps the Pope was informed that I had the greatest experience in Italy in colon and rectum surgery and chose to operate him“Explains Vittorio Alfieri.
And he continued: “Then the Pope told me: ‘I decided to surgery and chose you.’ I visited him and felt all the responsibility. ‘Let’s look at the program. Where will I be operated on? ‘ he told me. I had the clear feeling that he wanted to go anywhere, in any hospital I decided, but I replied, this time very decisively, that if he wanted to be operated on by me there was no other choice than Gemelli. He agreed, but on his own terms: “I will come on Sunday after operation. No one should know. If learned, I won’t be operated on me“».
Doctors managed to keep the secret: “The official version was that a foreign head of state arrived who wanted the highest possible confidentiality. He clarified that any decision in his place should be taken by Strapetti. And then something happened that I can only reveal now. “
And he explained: “A few minutes before the surgery, Strapetti told me that the Pope wanted to see me. I went to his room and blessed my hands. It was an incredible emotion, the meaning of which I only understood later. Want to tell me to use your hands for your job but to use your hands with your heart in the coming years. As if he wanted to say, you are a Catholic but now you have something more. It was a secret among the three of us, he wanted to be known and now I can say it “,
Shortly afterwards, Pope Francis underwent a second intervention, again secret: “After the first intervention, when he went home, he tried to clarify the importance of public health and the importance of preserving universal hospitals with a specific mission. He proved this by returning to Gemelli. “