Denise Van Outen nearly died while participating on Strictly Come Dancing.
The 48-year-old actress had to have surgery when a disc ‘dislodged’ into her spinal cord, and doctors told her that she was just fractions away from having a catastrophic damage.
‘When I took part in 2012, a disc dislodged into my spinal cord and I needed an operation,’ the star shared.
‘I was told that if the disc had gone into my spinal cord slightly more, I would have been paralysed from the neck down,’ she added before noting that she also injured herself when taking part in Dancing On Ice almost a decade later.
According to the Daily Star, Denise said: ‘Then, during Dancing On Ice in 2021, I fractured my shoulder in three parts. I can’t blame anybody – I was in shows knowing there was a risk.’
Denise has openly spoken about the injury she sustained during Strictly in the past.
Last year, she said on Channel 4’s Steph’s Packed Lunch: ‘I’ve got a scar on my neck […] from an injury I had years ago just after Strictly Come Dancing.’
The Mirror reports that the presenter added at the time: ‘I fell on my head and slipped three discs into my spinal cord, so I had quite major surgery.
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‘Now it’s all out in the open I don’t have to make excuses. It was such a personal thing for me at the time, quite a major surgery with quite a lot of rehabilitation, so I kept it private.’
Despite her injury, Denise performed in 2012’s Strictly Come Dancing final with her partner James Jordan and finished as a runner-up alongside Kimberley Walsh and Pasha Kovalev.
Louis Smith and Flavia Cacace won that year’s show.
Source My Celebrity Life.
