Pittsburgh Penguins left winger Pascal Dupuis was given some tough news this week, as it was announced Wednesday that the 35-year-old is suffering from a blood clot in his lung and will miss at the very least, six months, The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reported.
"Pascal had a blood clot in his leg that traveled to his lung," said Dr. Dharmesh Vyas, the Penguins' team physician. "In medical terms, that is a deep vein thrombosis resulting in a pulmonary embolism. This is the second such incident that we know of for Pascal. The treatment is at least six months of blood thinners, during which time he will not be able to play hockey. Other than that, his condition is stable."
Dupuis apparently also suffered a blood clot after tearing his ACL last January, and was put on blood thinners then, according to Yahoo! Sports.
The scariest aspect to all of this is, of course, Dupuis' health. But scarier for him and for the Penguins is what it means for his career prospects.
Dupuis is in the second season of a four-year deal that pays him an annual salary of $4 million with a cap hit of $3.75 million, according to Capgeek.com. He has six goals and five assists this season and a plus-2 rating, per Hockey-Reference.com.
The Philadelphia Flyers, who saw a similar situation occur this summer with veteran defender Kimmo Timonen, know all too well the perils of blood clots. Timonen, who was diagnosed with potentially life-threatening blood clots while training in his native Finland over the summer, was initially feared lost for only the first three months of the season, NHL.com reported.
Instead, further testing revealed a much deeper issue, and Timonen was ruled out for the year and has possibly seen the end of his career.
The Flyers have struggled to replace Timonen this season. The Penguins, who don't depend on Dupuis in quite the same manner as the Flyers did with Timonen, will still feel the sting of this loss.
Hopefully for them, and for Dupuis, it does not spell the end of his NHL career.
