Everything Eric Dane Said About His ALS Battle Before His Death at 53

Eric Dane spent the final months of his life helping bring visibility to amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS).

The Euphoria actor publicly announced his ALS diagnosis in an April 2025 statement to a news outlet.

"I have been diagnosed with ALS," he said. "I am grateful to have my loving family by my side as we navigate this next chapter."

Dane shared two children with his wife, Rebecca Gayheart.

He added, "I feel fortunate that I am able to continue working and am looking forward to returning to set of Euphoria next week. I kindly ask that you give my family and I privacy during this time."

Two months after going public with his ALS battle, Dane appeared in a sit-down interview with Good Morning America aired on June 16, 2025.

In the interview, he confirmed he began experiencing "some weakness" in his right hand before his diagnosis.

"I didn't really think anything of it at the time. I thought maybe I'd been texting too much or my hand was fatigued, but a few weeks later I noticed it got a little worse," he shared.

The Grey's Anatomy alum underwent tests and had consultations with two hand specialists and two neurologists. After nine months, he learned he had ALS.

"I will never forget those three letters," he told correspondent Diane Sawyer. "It's on me the second I wake up. It's not a dream."

In the months after revealing his health condition, Dane reportedly lost function of his right arm — leaving him worried about the loss of his legs, too.

The disease further left him "heartbroken" when he realized he no longer had the strength to swim during a trip with one of his daughters.

"She dragged me back to the boat," Dane, who was once a water polo star, recalled. "I was just, I was, like, heartbroken."

Having lost his father to suicide when he was 7 years old, the Charmed alum expressed his anger that ALS could also take him away from his daughters far too soon.

"And now, you know, there's a very good chance I'm going to be taken from my girls while they're very young," he continued.

In a video message in September 2025, Dane announced he had partnered with advocacy group I Am ALS.

"I'm Eric Dane — an actor, a father, and now a person living with ALS," he shared. "For over a century, ALS has been incurable, and we're done accepting the status quo. We need the fastest path to a cure, and that's why I partnered with I AM ALS on the Push for Progress."

He continued, "Our goal: a billion dollars over the next three years. Together, we'll renew the landmark law ACT for ALS, get promising treatments to thousands of patients like me, and finally, finally push toward ending this disease. There's so much more to learn, more to do, and we have to do it now."

Dane shared his determination to fight ALS for as long as he could while speaking with California congressman Eric Swalwell regarding federal funding for the incurable neurological disease's research.

"I wanna ring every bell," he told Swalwell. "I have two daughters at home. I wanna see them graduate college, get married, maybe have grandkids. You know I want to be there for all that so I'm going to fight until the last breath on this one."

After missing the 2025 Emmys, Dane called ALS a "nasty disease" in an October 2025 interview with The Washington Post.

"So I was in the hospital during the Emmys getting stitches put in my head," he said. "I was a really upset about it. But you know, there was nothing I could do about it."

Two months before his death, Dane appeared on Giving Tuesday at a virtual panel featuring I AM ALS and Synapticure co-founders Brian Wallach and Sandra Abrevaya.

During the panel, the Countdown star opened up about his Brilliant Minds role as he discussed how he was feeling.

According to Dane, he was willing to take on any "ALS-centric" roles as it would be "very difficult" for him to play "any other role, where, you know… look at the 800-pound gorilla in the room."

"And I'm fine with that," he continued. "I'm fine with that. I'm grateful that I can still work in any capacity."

Reflecting on his Brilliant Minds character, Dane added, "I've never played a character who's going through something and something I'm dealing with in real time, in real life as well. It was hard, and there were moments where it was very difficult for me to even get the lines out, but I overall, I was really grateful for the experience. I found it to be a bit cathartic."

He continued, "I have no reason to be in a good spirit at any time, on any given day, I don't think anybody would blame me if I went upstairs in my bedroom, crawled under the sheets, and spent the next two weeks crying. And I was a little bit pleasantly surprised when I realized that I wasn't built like that, because I thought for sure that was gonna be me."

During the same December 2025 panel, Dane told the attendees it was "imperative" to share his journey with the public because "[he doesn't] feel like [his] life is about [him] anymore."

"I make sure that people are aware of what ALS is and what it's about, and more importantly, what we can do to combat it and improve the landscape, because it's so rocky and littered with hurdles and bureaucracy and all this other nonsense that we're trying to sift through so we can get to a place where we go, start working on solution," said Dane.