Eric Young ready to return to TV after open heart surgery

Eric Young says he's recovered from nearly six hours of open heart surgery and will return to work tonight.

The Prime TV newsreader underwent surgery in November to repair a faulty heart valve, two days after his 56th birthday.

He told the Herald it was "the perfect birthday gift ... because it was sort of guaranteeing me a few more".

In a tweet, Young said he'd spent the last six weeks recuperating, and he was thankful for everyone who had helped his recovery.

"The last six weeks have been, to put it mildly, an education, mostly in gratitude," he wrote on the social media site.

"Thanks to everyone who helped. Medical staff, family, friends, colleagues. You were beyond awesome. Now it's time for a shave and #backtowork."

Young, an award-winning journalist who worked in radio, newspapers and at TV3 before joining Prime News in 2006, told the Herald he underwent surgery after being told he had a heart murmur.

"The two words that stuck out on my cardiologist's report were 'urgent and severe' ... I'm incredibly fortunate that I can afford health insurance — basically from 10 days after that conversation I was lying on a table and with a whole bunch of people looking after me.

"I've never been in a situation where your very existence is so beholden to other people and that was the only part that scared me. I was genuinely looking forward to the surgery because I was starting to become breathless.

"This is the best way I could describe it: You know how you're never aware of your heart? I was always aware of my heart. It was a heavy, loud presence in my chest and I never escaped it, until I did."

Young fronts Prime News weekdays at 5.30pm.