Oprah Winfrey Was Rushed to ER and Hospitalized With ‘Very Serious’ Case of Pneumonia

Oprah Winfrey is on the mend after she was recently rushed to the emergency room with a “very serious” case of pneumonia. Winfrey opened up about her health scare while appearing on The Ellen DeGeneres Show to promote her upcoming arena tour called Oprah’s 2020 Vision: Your Life in Focus and her new Oprah’s Book Club selection in an episode that is set to air Monday.

“I just got cleared yesterday,” Winfrey told host Ellen DeGeneres, according to The Hollywood Reporter. “So, here it is. I came back from overseas and I thought I had a cold — but it wasn’t a cold. I ended up in the emergency room and they said, ‘You have pneumonia.’ And I go home, and pneumonia is nothing to play with, y’all. It is very serious. And I was on antibiotics for a week and the antibiotics weren’t working. And then I go back for another CT scan and they go, ‘It’s actually worse. You should see a lung specialist.’”

The media mogul, who said that he had “a little rattling” in her chest, said that things seemed to be far more serious than she had initially thought.

“So I go into the lung specialist. … He puts his stethoscope here and I see the ‘Oh, shit’ face. It is like, ‘Oh my God, something’s wrong with you.’ And I can see it. He didn’t hide it,” she said, adding that the specialist advised her to “cancel everything” and abstain from flying for a month.”

Thankfully, Winfrey said that she is now on the upswing of things.

“I went back in a week and I was better,” she said. “He called me every day to make sure I was using the inhaler and taking the right antibiotics. And when I walked in and I was better, he thanked me three times for getting better and said, ‘Can I have a hug?’ And I could tell he was like, ‘Not on my watch is this going to happen.’”

Following her scary experience, Winfrey had a piece of advice and a warning for the audience.

“Don’t play with it. Get your flu shots and get your pneumonia shots,” she warned. “It’s nothing to play with. It takes people out. But I’m telling you, it changed the way I look at wellness.”

Winfrey is now busy preparing for her upcoming tour, which is set to kick off at Fort Lauderdale, Florida’s BB&T Center on Jan. 4.