Sen. Lindsey Graham just died of aorta disease. My husband did too.

Senator Lindsey Graham died on Saturday, July 11th, at the age of 71, with the medical examiner's preliminary finding pointing to an aortic dissection. This condition involves a tear in the aorta, the body's largest artery, which carries blood from the heart. While the final death certificate is pending, the event has been widely described as sudden, underscoring the often-silent nature of aortic diseases.

Aortic diseases manifest in three primary ways: aneurysms, which are slow-developing bulges in the artery wall; dissections, which are sudden tears within the wall; and ruptures, where the wall fails completely, leading to catastrophic bleeding. These conditions are related but distinct. Dissections are often linked to high blood pressure and hardened arteries, particularly in older individuals, and can occur without a prior aneurysm. Aneurysms, especially in younger people, may have a genetic component related to connective tissue weakness.

The author draws a parallel between Graham's death and that of her husband, Grant Wahl. Graham's aorta tore, a dissection exacerbated by age and arteriosclerotic cardiovascular disease. In contrast, her husband's aorta bulged and then burst, a condition more likely to be inherited. While Graham's case represents the more common form driven by lifestyle and age, the author notes that dissections can be easily mistaken for heart attacks, emphasizing the need for emergency rooms to consider aortic tears. The only widely recommended screening is a one-time ultrasound for specific groups of men to detect abdominal aneurysms.