BANGKOK - Thailand's deeply revered king, the world's longest reigning monarch, was treated for a minor brain bleed in the hospital where he has lived since 2009, the palace said Friday. King Bhumibol Adulyadej's heartbeat and blood pressure had returned to normal following the incident, but doctors advised him to suspend public activities for the time being, the royal Household Bureau said in statement. A team of royal physicians treated the 84-year-old on Thursday evening after he was observed with a "spasming of his right hand" and a "slightly faster heartbeat".
"Doctors used x-rays to examine his brain and found a small amount of blood had percolated through the left side of the meninges (the membrane around the brain)," the statement said. The king was treated with "medicine intravenously and after that the spasm stopped".
The king's illness comes at a particularly sensitive time in politically turbulent Thailand, after a Constitutional Court ruling on Friday that threatened to reignite inflammatory divides in the nation.
The court, which had been surrounded by security forces ahead of the ruling, dismissed an opposition complaint against the governing party, which had faced a possible dissolution in the crunch verdict.
Any discussion of the royal family is extremely sensitive in Thailand, where the palace has been silent over the organisation of the eventual succession.
The king was admitted to hospital in September 2009 for treatment of a respiratory condition.
His latest public appearance was Saturday July 7, when he toured the Chao Phraya river on a navy boat. His plans to travel to the central province of Ratchaburi on Sunday have been postponed.