DIY SOS star to walk with lifesaving doctor

A television star who went through open-heart surgery is to walk alongside the surgeon who saved his life.

DIY SOS' Mark Millar suffered a heart attack while open water swimming in the sea at Clevedon earlier this year.

"The NHS gave me a second chance at life. I enjoy my free time and seeing friends, and life seems simple but it's very full now," he said.

Mr Millar will join others walking 10km around Bristol's harbour to raise money for the Bristol & Weston Hospitals Charity, with his surgeon Prof Gianni Angelini.

Mr Millar said there were a few "red flags" in the run up to his heart attack that he dismissed as "aches and pains."

"I was getting indigestion in the middle of the night, and I kept having numbness in my left arm which felt like I had an injection.

"I was also getting exhausted in the afternoons."

When the heart attack happened, it felt "like a ratchet strap" around his chest.

Mr Millar's life was saved by his friends and his inflatable swimming buoy.

He was told by surgeons at the Bristol Royal Infirmary's Heart Institute that he had cardiovascular disease and needed immediate surgery.

"It turns out it was hereditary, my dad died from a heart attack.

"I could live on triple filtered water and lettuce leaves for the rest of my life and my body would still produce this cholesterol," he told BBC Radio Bristol.

Mr Millar said he had been given a "second chance" by the surgeons who saved his life, and wanted to give something back.

"A 10k walk for me now is like running a marathon, but I've been given the chance to do this walk and I'm going to do it with my doctor," he said.

The Big Bristol Walk leaves from the Amphitheatre at 10:00 BST.

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