Wrist surgery for Pope after fall on holiday

Pope Benedict XVI has had an operation to repair a fractured wrist after suffering a fall while on holiday in Italy.

The Pontiff, 82, who takes a summer break in a chalet at Les Combes — near Aosta in the Italian Alps — also twisted his ankle in the bathroom fall last night.

He was able to walk to the casualty department of the Parini hospital for X-rays, which revealed a small fracture, after arriving with his private secretary just before 10am — having already celebrated dawn Mass and had breakfast.

The Pope's new personal doctor, Dr Patrizio Poliseca, 56, an eminent cardiologist, was with him. Vatican sources were quick to say the injury was "not serious" but the Pope was in "some pain".

A spokesman for the hospital said the surgery to realign the bone fragments, performed under local anaesthesia, had "gone well".