On May 26, 2025, Donald Trump underwent a routine physical at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, and the White House released the official three-page memo shortly after. The report, signed by White House physician Dr. Sean Barbabella, concludes Trump is in “excellent health” and fully fit for duty — but buried in the numbers is a more complicated picture: a 14-pound weight gain in roughly six months, leg swelling, bruised hands, and a formal recommendation to eat better and move more.
What the Numbers Actually Say
Trump stands at 6 feet 3 inches and now weighs 238 pounds, up from 224 pounds at his April 2025 exam. That puts his BMI at 29.7 — technically “overweight,” sitting at the border just below the “obese” threshold of 30. His blood pressure was recorded at 105/71, with a resting heart rate of 73 beats per minute, both within normal range.
The cardiovascular section is where the report gets its strongest positive claim. Dr. Barbabella noted that Trump’s “cardiac age” is approximately 14 years younger than his chronological age, based on an AI-enhanced electrocardiogram analysis. He continues to take low-dose aspirin alongside two cholesterol-control medications — rosuvastatin and ezetimibe. On paper, his heart is performing like a man in his mid-60s.
The report also addressed a few things the public had already noticed. The visible bruising on Trump’s hands, which had circulated widely on social media, was attributed to “minor soft tissue irritation related to frequent handshaking” while on aspirin therapy — benign, according to the physician. Slight lower leg swelling, linked to a pre-existing diagnosis of chronic venous insufficiency, has reportedly improved since last year. And scarring on his right ear is documented as consistent with the gunshot wound he sustained during the July 2024 assassination attempt.
The Cognitive Test Trump Won’t Stop Talking About
Ahead of his 80th birthday, the cognitive portion of the exam carried more political weight than anything else in the report. Trump scored a perfect 30 out of 30 on the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA), a standard screening tool used to detect early signs of dementia or cognitive decline.
Trump went further than simply noting the result. On Truth Social, he claimed this was his fourth perfect score across four separate cognitive tests over the years — “120 correct answers out of 120 questions asked” — and framed it as evidence of “extreme intelligence.” Medical experts, for their part, are consistent on this point: the MoCA is not an IQ test. It’s designed to catch decline, not measure brilliance. Scoring 30/30 means a patient shows no signs of cognitive impairment. It does not mean what Trump says it means — but it also doesn’t mean nothing.
Using the results as political leverage, he called for Congress to make high-difficulty cognitive testing a legal requirement for anyone running for President or Vice President. “All people running for President and Vice President should be forced to take high difficulty Cognitive Tests,” he wrote. The push is clearly aimed at reframing age scrutiny as a test he’s already passed — and one he wants others to have to take.
Excellent Health, With a Side of Doctor’s Orders
The official conclusion is unambiguous: Dr. Barbabella cleared Trump as fully fit to serve as Commander-in-Chief. But the same report includes formal preventive counseling advising the President to focus on diet, increased physical activity, and continued weight loss to address the recent gain. For a sitting president who has publicly joked that he works out “about one minute a day, max” and credits his health to habits he himself admits aren’t great — “I don’t know why. It’s not because I eat the best foods” — the doctor’s recommendations read less like a formality and more like an honest flag.
Right after leaving Walter Reed, Trump posted on Truth Social: “Just finished my 6 month physical at Walter Reed Military Medical Center. Everything checked out PERFECTLY.” That framing — PERFECTLY — is technically supported by the report’s conclusion, but it skips over the 14-pound gain, the swelling, and the advice to change his habits. Whether you read the report as a clean bill of health or a quietly cautionary document depends entirely on which paragraph you stop at.