Comedian Mike King has been admitted to hospital for the second time this week with what close friends are now describing as a "worrying" heart condition.
King, 45, was taken to hospital last Monday with low blood pressure and dizziness.
On Friday, following a day at home, hewas readmitted with the same symptoms, his manager David Steele said yesterday.
"He's not great, which is sad. It's definitely cardio related, but the doctors still haven't identified exactly what is wrong. Everyone is concerned."
He said King, whose wife Rose was at his bedside yesterday, was due to have more tests today.
"The big strain for Rose and the kids [Nathan, 20, Te Aroha, 18, and Elli, 9] is the not knowing. That's the tough part."
Steele had visited King in hospital last week and been in contact via phone text yesterday.
While he was in good spirits, and had managed to crack several jokes, King was definitely not "the Mike we all know and love".
The tiredness and dizzy spells - "even walking to his car made him exhausted" - were frustrating.
King's illness is the latest in a series of health problems he has suffered over the past 10 months. It is believed to be a complication of a stroke he suffered in January. Late last year he broke his tail bone and fronted a campaign for the Phobic Trust after admitting battles with depression.
A familiar face on television, King once famously sent an expletive-ridden text message to fellow comedian Jeremy Wells after a cartoon on Wells' show said he was "unfunny".
He is also poster boy for the New Zealand Pork Industry Board and was Metro people's choice best comedian for three years running from 2001.
