Grammy award-winning country music singer Randy Travis is out of emergency surgery but still in critical condition after suffering a stroke in a Texas hospital.
The procedure was intended to relieve pressure on the brain of the 54-year-old Travis, who was taken to hospital on Sunday for a heart condition caused by a virus, the hospital management said in a statement on its website.
"He is out of surgery and remains in critical condition," the singer's spokesman Kirt Webster said in an email.
Travis was suffering from cardiomyopathy and congestive heart failure when he was admitted, his doctors have said.
Webster said earlier family and friends were with him at the Heart Hospital Baylor Plano, north of Dallas, and they requested the prayers and support of his fans. "As a complication of his congestive heart failure Mr Randy Travis has suffered a stroke and is currently undergoing surgery to relieve pressure on his brain. He is in critical condition," Webster said.
Cardiomyopathy weakens and enlarges the heart and can lead to heart failure.
Doctors had earlier said the singer was responding to treatment for the heart condition. One of his doctors said Travis had been in excellent health until three weeks ago when he developed a viral upper respiratory illness.
His publicist said on Tuesday that Travis had undergone a procedure to place a device in his heart to help it pump on its own.
A six-time Grammy award winner, Travis is known for hits such as Forever and Ever Amen and Three Wooden Crosses – but also for a string of drunken indiscretions in recent years.
He was arrested in August 2012 for driving while intoxicated after walking into a store naked and trying to buy cigarettes, then crashing his car – he was found at the accident scene lying unclothed on the road. Travis received a fine and probation.
The singer lives in the north Texas community of Tioga about 60 miles (100km) north of Dallas.
