Featured Image Credit: Gilbert Flores/Variety via Getty Images/Ron Tom/Disney General Entertainment Content via Getty Images
Topics: Celebrity, TV And Film, Grey's Anatomy, Health
Rhiannon Ingle
Topics: Celebrity, TV And Film, Grey's Anatomy, Health
Grey's Anatomy star Eric Dane has revealed that he's been diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS).
Dane - who starred on the hit ABC medical drama as Dr Mark Sloan - opened up to people about the condition which is a type of motor neurone disease which sees muscle weakness in the arms and legs that can cause you to trip and drop things.
"I have been diagnosed with ALS," the 52-year-old actor shared to PEOPLE. "I am grateful to have my loving family by my side as we navigate this next chapter."
Dane, who shares two children, Billie Beatrice, 15, and Georgia Geraldine, 13, with his wife Rebecca Gayheart, continued: "I feel fortunate that I am able to continue working and am looking forward to returning to set of Euphoria next week.
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"I kindly ask that you give my family and I privacy during this time."
Dane portrays the Jacobs family patriarch in the teen drama series which is set to begin production of the third season next week (14 April).
There is currently no cure for ALS, and people diagnosed with the condition usually live three to five years after diagnosis, according to the Muscular Dystrophy Association. However, with that said, some patients can live for decades.
The Mayo Clinic explains that, while ALS often begins with muscle twitching and weakness in an arm or leg, trouble swallowing or slurred speech, it can eventually affect control of the muscles needed to move, speak, eat and breathe.
Fans of Grey's Anatomy will remember when his character, Dr Mark Sloan, was put on life-support following a pretty devastating plane crash in the season eight finale.
While many viewers hoped the whole ordeal was nothing but a fever dream, they were soon met with the reality that he'd been killed off after the character succumbed to his injuries and died peacefully with his friends by his side in the season nine premiere.
While viewers found it hard to let go of one of the show's most iconic stars, they were later blindsided to discover that the actor hadn't actually wanted to say goodbye when he did.
Instead, he claims he was 'probably fired' from the TV show by producers in 2012, speaking out on his exit in a bombshell interview.
During an appearance on the Armchair Expert podcast last year, Dane - who starred on the show for six seasons from 2006 to 2012 - claimed: "I didn’t leave so much as I think I was let go."
Podcast host Dax Shepard then went on to ask the actor about his prior struggles with both drugs and alcohol addiction, and whether or not they affected his exit.
"I was struggling," Dane replied, adding: "They didn’t let me go because of that, although it definitely didn’t help."
In fact, he alluded to the possibility that, having become one of Grey's Anatomy's most in-demand actors, he'd simply become 'too expensive'.
"I was starting to become - as most of these actors who have spent significant time on the show - you start to become very expensive for the network," Dane explained.
"And the network knows that the show is going to do what it’s going to do irrespective of who they keep on it - as long as they have their Grey they were fine."