Former Gov. Ben Cayetano, the front-runner in the race for Honolulu mayor, is recovering after he was hospitalized Sunday with what doctors "strongly suspect" to be a bleeding ulcer, his wife said Monday.
Further tests were being conducted to confirm the preliminary diagnosis, Vicky Cayetano said, but no results were released late Monday.
Cayetano, who is 72, was working from his room at the Queen’s Medical Center up until the time of the medical procedure, his wife said.
He was catching up on emails by early Monday evening. Those included a brief response to a Star-Advertiser email sent earlier in the day on an unrelated matter and before his wife made public his hospitalization at a news conference at Cayetano campaign headquarters. He did not respond to a follow-up email.
When Cayetano would be released was not known, but his wife said it could be as early as today or Wednesday, depending on the severity of the ulcer.
"It’s not life-threatening at all," Vicky Cayetano said. "From everything we’ve been told by the doctors involved, this is treatable, and he’ll be back to his full schedule, we think, by Wednesday."
Cayetano is facing incumbent Mayor Peter Carlisle and former city Managing Director Kirk Caldwell in the mayoral primary Saturday. The former governor holds a double-digit lead over both challengers, according to the Hawaii Poll conducted last month for the Star-Advertiser and Hawaii News Now.
His campaign rivals wished him well on behalf of themselves and their spouses.
"Donna and I are keeping the Cayetano family in our thoughts today, and we wish Ben a speedy recovery," Caldwell said.
Said Carlisle, "Judy and I send our thoughts and best wishes to Ben and Vicky for an easy and speedy recovery."
Cayetano also had a bleeding ulcer in 1997 when he was governor and was hospitalized for five days after passing out at his home.
On Sunday his wife said he recognized some of the same symptoms — including cold sweats — and called his doctor.
"In ’97 that was far more serious because he didn’t recognize the symptoms right away, and so he waited until he lost so much blood that he passed out in the middle of the night," Vicky Cayetano said. "This is why (on Sunday) when he started to see the same symptoms, we talked to his doctor, and it was his doctor who said, ‘I don’t want to wait until Monday to see you. You should go into the ER right now.’"
He was admitted, and doctors performed preliminary tests that indicated a bleeding ulcer. She said more serious problems, such as heart attack or stroke, were ruled out.
Cayetano said her husband was to have a procedure Monday known as an endoscopy, in which doctors use a tiny camera to examine the affected area and confirm the initial diagnosis. Once the ulcer is confirmed, the doctors can decide whether to stitch it to prevent further bleeding or treat it with antibiotics.
Both procedures can be done during the endoscopic procedure, she said.
Depending on the amount of blood lost, he may require a transfusion as he did in 1997, she said.
Vicky Cayetano said doctors described a "perfect storm" of factors that contributed to the ulcer, including his "grueling" schedule and stress associated with the campaign, which she described as uncharacteristically negative for Hawaii politics.
"I think this campaign has been, for us, unusual in that it’s taken on a very negative tone," she said without being specific. "I think in Hawaii that’s not usually what we see in our campaigns."
She said the negativity has affected him "to some degree."
"He’s a tough guy but he’s not a machine,"she said. "He’s not a robot. He has feelings, too."
The most prominent attacks against Cayetano have been in ads paid for by Pacific Resource Partnership, an advocacy group for contractors and unionized carpenters and construction workers that supports the rail project. Cayetano is the only candidate opposed to the $5.26 billion project.
John White, executive director of PRP, said the group planned to pull its ads from radio and television airwaves.
"We are saddened to hear that Gov. Ben Cayetano has been hospitalized," White said in a statement. "We are suspending the broadcast of our television and radio commercials. The decision was made as soon as we learned about Gov. Cayetano’s condition. We have contacted the television and radio stations playing our commercials and have asked them to take our spots off the air.
"We hope Gov. Ben Cayetano will make a speedy and full recovery."
Vicky Cayetano said she did not expect the ulcer to affect her husband moving forward, noting that it has been 15 years between incidents.
"I’ve never seen my husband work as hard as he has the last seven months, and I think that frankly, neither the negative campaigning that’s being waged against him nor bleeding ulcer is going to hold him back from giving his all to the very finish," she said.
In the primary election Saturday, a candidate must get more than 50 percent of the vote to win the mayor’s office outright. Otherwise, the two candidates with the most votes will face off in the general election in November.
