JERUSALEM, Jan. 12 (Xinhuanet) -- A brain scan that Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has just undergone showed positive results, doctors said on Thursday.

    According to a statement issued by Jerusalem's Hadassah hospital where Sharon is being treated, Sharon's brain scan on Thursday evening showed that the remnants of the blood in his brain from a severe stroke and haemorrhage last week have been absorbed.

    Doctors had removed a tube they had put into Sharon's skull to reduce intracranial pressure, according to the statement.

    The prime minister has remained in critical but stable condition, it added.

    Meanwhile, doctors said Sharon was taken to the operating room on Thursday evening to receive a semi-permanent peripherally inserted central catheter (PICC line) in his arm that will make it easier to give him infusions.

    Charles Weissman, Hadassah's chief of anesthesiology, confirmed to local newspaper The Jerusalem Post that Sharon had shown signs of an excessively rapid heartbeat for a short time while in his hospital bed.

    "This is not surprising, and very common among intensive care unit patients. It is not a setback at all. We caught it quickly and gave him Procor, a drug that slows down the heartbeat. It is under control," said the professor.

    The hospital spokeswoman also confirmed that the insertion of the PICC line was meant to make it easier to give Sharon a variety of liquids and medications.

    Weissman explained that Sharon's initial catheter was introduced into the jugular vein in his neck, the vein that brings de-oxygenated blood from the head, neck, arm and chest regions of the body to the right atrium of the heart. Enditem