Former Tampa Bay Buccaneers head coach Bruce Arians dealt with a health scare recently.
Arians revealed this week that he was taken to the hospital by ambulance after he experienced chest pains on Oct. 8. The 70-year-old said he and his wife Christine were entertaining guests at their Tampa home when he began to feel unwell. He initially thought he was experiencing heartburn, but the pain got progressively worse.
“On the night before the Atlanta game, we had a house full of people. We ate and I got these pains way up here, like two knives going in,” Arians told Ira Kaufmann of JoeBucsFan.com on Wednesday. “The more I tried to take a breath, the worse it got.
“I took some TUMS, thinking it was indigestion, but it just got worse. I called Christine back to the bedroom and said I can’t shake this pain. We called 911 and they put me on a stretcher to Tampa General.”
Doctors initially feared that Arians had suffered a mild heart attack, but he said scans showed “no fluid, no heart damage and absolutely no blockages.” Arians was prescribed anti-inflammatory medication after being diagnosed with myocarditis, which is inflammation of the heart muscle.
Arians, who works as a special advisor to Bucs general manager Jason Licht, spent four days in the hospital. He was away from the team for three games but returned for Tampa Bay’s Oct. 27 loss to the Baltimore Ravens on “Thursday Night Football.”
As Kaufman notes, Arians was hospitalized with symptoms of a heart attack when he was coaching the Arizona Cardinals in 2016. He spent one night in the hospital before being released.
Arians surprisingly stepped down as the head coach of the Bucs after last season. Some questioned why he was on the sideline for a game earlier this season, though there was an explanation for that.
The Bucs are inducting Arians into their Ring of Honor during their final home game of the season on Jan. 1.
