US President Donald Trump is in excellent health, his physician said on Saturday after he underwent his first physical examination since taking office.

The examination at the Walter Reed National Military Medical Centre lasted several hours and was likely to measure things like Trump’s blood pressure, cholesterol, blood sugar, heart rate and weight.“The President’s physical exam went exceptionally well,” Dr Ronnie Jackson said in a brief statement. “The President is in excellent health,” said Jackson after the test.

Dr Jackson has been a physician to the President for three consecutive administrations.

He is scheduled to brief the media on January 16 when he is expected to provide a detailed readout of the exam. A routine annual affair for every US president, Trump’s medical checkup is being widely reported and has drawn media attention in view of his political opponents raising questions about his health. Trump, 71, himself dismissed any question about his health.

“I think it’s going to go very well. I’ll be very surprised if it doesn’t,” Trump told reporters on Thursday. “It (had) better go well, otherwise the stock market will not be happy,” he joked in response to a question on his health.

Two months before the November 2016 election, Trump released a five-paragraph letter from his longtime physician, Dr Harold Bornstein, who concluded that Trump “is in excellent physical health.” The 2016 letter put Trump’s BP and cholesterol measurements in the healthy range, though he uses a cholesterol-lowering statin medication. His EKG, chest X- ray, echocardiogram and blood sugar were normal.

The 6-foot-3 Trump weighed 107 kg, and his body mass index of 29.5 put him in the overweight category.

PTI