The White House is refusing to say when Donald Trump had his most recent cognitive test after the results of his latest medical examination did not mention one.
And officials have also declined to comment further on the MRI scan the president revealed he’d undergone this month, which has reignited speculation about the 79-year-old’s health.
While Trump insists he is in excellent shape, renewed questions emerged on Monday after he let it slip that his latest check-up at Walter Reed Medical Center on October 10 included Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI), which can highlight symptoms associated with conditions such as strokes, brain issues, or tumors.
“I got an MRI. It was perfect,” Trump said in response to a question from reporters aboard Air Force One.
“I gave you the full results. We had an MRI, and the machine, you know, the whole thing, it was perfect,” he added.
But the “results” provided by White House physician Sean Barbabella simply said Trump underwent “advanced imaging” (which can also include CT scans and other tests) and did not, in fact, reveal that the president had an MRI, let alone why it was conducted or what it found.
In another glaring omission, there was also no mention in the report of whether Trump took a cognitive test, which formed part of his first medical examination in April.
After the April check-up, Barbabella provided three pages of results, which detailed everything from Trump’s lab tests and the medicine he was taking to his vital statistics and all the physical examinations he’d had.
Among them was the Montreal Cognitive Assessment, a 30-point test that screens for cognitive impairment, for which Trump achieved a score of 30 out of 30.
However, the report of Trump’s latest visit came in the form of a five-paragraph summary that did not make any reference to a cognitive test. When asked by the Daily Beast if Trump had one, the White House did not respond.
Trump referenced the cognitive tests on Monday while criticizing Democratic Party congresswomen Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Jasmine Crockett as “low IQ” people who wouldn’t do well on such assessments.
“The first couple of questions are easy: a tiger, an elephant, a giraffe, you know,” he explained.
“When you get up to about five or six, and then when you get up to 10 and 20 and 25, they couldn’t come close to answering any of those questions.”
But the president didn’t offer specific details on whether he took the same one he had in April, or his most recent score.
The evasiveness surrounding Trump’s health is not unusual for presidents: Woodrow Wilson, for example, hid details about his strokes, John F Kennedy did not disclose his back problems and Joe Biden famously covered up the extent of his cognitive decline.
But Trump’s October 10 visit raised eyebrows at the time, as it was the second in six months and took place amid ongoing speculation over his deeply bruised hands and swollen ankles.
His latest revelation of an MRI has now sparked further questions, with prominent cardiologist Dr Jonathan Reiner saying he believes the president may have quietly had an MRI scan because he showed symptoms associated with a neurological issue.
“Typically, they’re prompted by symptoms,” Reiner told CNN.
“They can be neurologic symptoms that prompt an MRI. They could be back pain that prompts an MRI. There can be issues with the heart that would prompt an MRI. And for those reasons, the public should really be told, you know, why did the president undergo the test, what consultants he saw, and what was the result of the testing?”
Reiner also added that an MRI is “never part of a routine evaluation, whether you’re president of the United States or whether you’re just a civilian.”
Despite the speculation, the October 10 report of Trump’s visit to Walter Reed nonetheless stated he was in “excellent overall health,” that his cardiac age was 14 years younger than his 79 years, and that comprehensive lab studies performed as part of the visit were “exceptional.”
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