Christopher “Kid” Reid, one-half of hip-hop and acting duo Kid ‘N Play, says he underwent a successful heart transplant surgery that saved his life last year.
The entertainer opened up about his health journey during the Thursday (Feb. 5) episode of Good Morning America, revealing to anchor Michael Strahan that he had been diagnosed with congestive heart failure.
The condition occurs when the heart becomes too weak to pump blood and is generally caused by an unhealthy diet, smoking, stress, a sedentary lifestyle, and other triggers.
“Over the last year or so, [I] maybe just starting feeling more fatigued than before, shortness of breath, sleeping more than normal,” said the House Party star.
Reid excused his symptoms as “getting older” and occasionally touring, but when the signs worsened, he went to the emergency room of Los Angeles medical facility Cedars-Sinai.
Three weeks after being treated with medication, Reid’s doctor, Dr. Erika Jones, noticed that the entertainer was “very swollen,” an unusual sign for those on the treatment plan.
“The blood work confirmed my suspicion. It showed that his heart was failing and it was starting to affect his other organs,” Dr. Jones explained.
The 61-year-old was placed on a heart transplant waitlist but was “high” priority considering that he was in a “life-or-death situation,” said Reid’s surgeon, Laura DiChiacchio.
The transplant was secured nine days later, and the seven-hour surgery was successful.
“A lot of people are walking around with heart disease because they don’t go to the doctor. And you know, traditionally, people of color, we don’t go,” Reid said.
“We don’t go for a lot of reasons. Sometimes we don’t go because we don’t have insurance. A lot of times we don’t go because we don’t want the bad news or we too busy just hustling trying to make it from day to day and we feel we don’t got time or we’ll get over it.
“Well, you might not,” he continued. “So I’m urging all of my fans, all of your loved ones, to get checked out.”