New details about the cause of Val Kilmer’s death have been revealed more than a week since the legendary Top Gun died at the age of 65, on April 1, 2025.
The death certificate issued in the case of Val Kilmer, consulted by TMZ, confirms that the actor died from a pneumonia, after his daughter had revealed from the beginning that the lung infection killed her father.
Three causes listed on the death certificate
Causes listed on the Los Angeles’ Health Department’s death certificate are “Acute hypoxemic respiratory failure, chronic respiratory insufficiency and squamous cell carcinoma from the base of the tongue.”
Squamous cell carcinoma – also known as laryngeal cancer – is a type of cancer that develops in thin and flat cells that lick the neck, including larynx and pharynx, explains dailymail.co.uk,
Val Kilmer has tried, for a while, to deny that he has cancer
Diagnosed with cancer in 2014, the actor initially hid his disease. His health problems became obvious for the first time in January 2015, when a spokesman told People that Kilmer was urgently taken to the hospital “for a possible tumor ”.
Later, the actor denied on Facebook that he had a tumor, just saying that “He had a complication ”.
In October 2015, the actor again assured his fans that he was fine, stating that he went to the hospital just to “Check that I have no tumors or infection of any kind, which was checked by the very caring experts from UCLA.”
Val Kilmer in Top Gun. Profimedia photo
However, the actor was forced to follow radiotherapy and chemotherapy procedures, as well as a tracheostomy, a procedure that created an artificial hole in the throat to help to breathe.
The operation is definitively damaged by vocal cords and, consequently, compromise the voice forever.
Communicate using a special device
In the documentary Amazon entitled “Val”, the actor spoke honestly about how his life was changed because of the cancer and how he had to resort to an electric device – a vocal box mounted on the artificial hole in the throat, to speak – and about the whistle he was removing.
“Obviously I call much worse than I feel. I can’t talk without filling this hole (in the throat)he said.
What tracheostomy entails
Tracheostomy is a surgical procedure through which a trachea opening is created (the tube that takes the air from the neck to the lungs) through an incision to the neck.
This opening, called the stomach, allows the introduction of a tube to facilitate the patient’s breathing. The procedure is required when the patient cannot breathe naturally, for example, due to a blocking of the airways or serious respiratory problems and may be temporary or permanent, depending on the patient’s medical situation.
