Drew Carey: A New Lifestyle

Nov. 14 -- In real life, Drew Carey is a lot like the character he plays on his sitcom: an average guy from Middle America who's got a horrible diet, is overweight — and, he learned this summer, at high risk for a heart attack.

The 43-year-old narrowly escaped a massive heart attack in August, and he subsequently had an angioplasty procedure to open a clogged artery in his heart.

He has since made some serious life changes.

"I feel fantastic," he said. "I've never felt better in my life."

With his new lifestyle, Carey has lost about 40 pounds, and doctors say his prognosis is good.

‘A Heart Attack Waiting to Happen’

Carey was out jogging when he had chest pains and a tingling pain in his arms and shoulders. By the time he made it home, his chest felt tight, but he said the pain had gone away.

"But I was really shaken by it … I was really upset," he said. So shaken and upset that he went to Bob's Big Boy for chili spaghetti that night, had steak and eggs for breakfast the following morning, and then didn't even mention his chest pains to his doctor during a physical that day.

He thought the pains may have just been stress-related. After a long day of rehearsal, the pain was back and more intense than ever. He went to his trailer, where he nearly collapsed. The paramedics came to his trailer on the Warner Bros. lot, and Carey knew he was in good hands when the nurse's lab coat had a picture of Bugs Bunny with a stethoscope.

"The cartoon team is taking care of me," laughed Carey, who was making jokes even when he was in dire pain. He was rushed to St. Joseph's Medical Center in Burbank, where it was discovered that he was not having a heart attack, but one of his arteries was 95 percent blocked.

"Drew was clearly a heart attack waiting to happen," said Dr. Daniel Eisenberg, a cardiac trauma specialist who treated him for acute coronary syndrome.

Carey had an angioplasty, which essentially pries open the blocked artery with a tiny balloon covered with a spring called a stent.