Khaleda Zia scheduled for health check-up at Evercare Hospital this evening

BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia will visit Evercare Hospital in the capital this (Wednesday) evening for a health check-up.

"Madam [Khaleda] will be taken  to Evercare Hospital in the evening for health check-ups as per the advice of her medical board," Shamsuddin Didar, the BNP chief's media wing member, told UNB.

He said Khaleda will undergo some necessary medical tests at the hospital. 

The 78-year-old former prime minister has long been suffering from various ailments, including liver cirrhosis, arthritis, diabetes, and issues related to kidney, lung, heart, and eye.

On 31 March, the BNP chairperson was admitted to the hospital and stayed there for two days for pathological tests and regular examinations. 

Since her conditional release from jail in 2020, the BNP chief has been receiving treatment at the hospital under a medical board headed by cardiologist Prof Shahabuddin Talukder.

Khaleda was sent to the Old Dhaka Jail after a lower court sentenced her to five years imprisonment in the Zia Orphanage Trust corruption case on 8 February 2018. Later that same year, she was found guilty in another corruption case.

Amid the coronavirus outbreak, the government temporarily freed Khaleda Zia from jail through an executive order suspending her sentence on 25 March 2020, with the condition that she stay in her Gulshan house and not leave the country. That has since been extended multiple times to keep her out of jail.

Khaleda's doctors have been recommending sending her abroad since she was diagnosed with liver cirrhosis in November 2021.

On 26 October last year, three US specialist doctors completed the hepatic procedure known as transjugular intrahepatic portosystemic shunt (TIPS procedure) to stop water accretion in Khaleda Zia's stomach and chest, and bleeding in her liver.