President Carter, 95, the country's oldest living president. He was admitted to Emory University Hospital three weeks after suffering a minor pelvic fracture in a fall at his home in Plains, Georgia. He was released from the hospital a few days after that accident.

A previous fall earlier in October required stitches to Carter's face, but he resumed work soon after on a home-building project for the nonprofit group Habitat for Humanity.

In May, the former Democratic president broke his hip, also at home, requiring him to undergo surgery.. He was hospitalised briefly in 2017 for dehydration and was diagnosed with skin cancer in 2015.

No information was immediately provided about the circumstances leading to his latest hospitalisation.

The procedure to relieve pressure on his brain was scheduled for Tuesday morning, the Carter Center said, adding that he was "resting comfortably" and that his wife, Rosalynn, 92, was with him.

Carter, a former peanut farmer and Georgia governor, defeated Republican President Gerald Ford in 1976 to become the nation's 39th president, serving a single four-year term in the White House.

His presidency was overshadowed by an economic recession, an energy crisis and the taking of US hostages by Iran, but he also played a leading role in brokering the Camp David Accords leading to an Egypt-Israel peace treaty.

He lost his 1980 re-election bid to Republican Ronald Reagan.

After leaving office in 1981, Carter went on to become an international fixture and a noted humanitarian.

He won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002 for his efforts toward finding peaceful solutions to international conflicts, advancing democracy and human rights and promoting economic and social development.

He and his wife founded the Carter Center in 1982 to carry on their international and humanitarian work.

Carter has lived longer after leaving the White House than any former president in US history.

Australian Associated Press