More than 58 million Americans live with a rheumatic disease, and some of them are household names. These 11 famous faces have spoken about their experiences with rheumatic diseases — a term applied to more than 100 different ailments, including lupus, rheumatoid arthritis, and gout. Here’s what they have to say about their diagnosis, symptoms, and treatment.
That ’70s Show actor Ashton Kutcher said he’s “lucky to be alive” after battling vasculitis, a serious autoimmune disease that impaired his hearing, vision, and walking ability.
“I had this weird, super rare form of vasculitis,” Kutcher said in 2022, according to Access Hollywood. “[It] knocked out my vision, knocked out my hearing, knocked out like all my equilibrium. It took me like a year to build it all back up.”
“You don’t really appreciate it until it’s gone,” Kutcher, 46, added. “Until you go, ‘I don’t know if I’m ever going to be able to see again, I don’t know if I’m ever going to be able to hear again, I don’t know if I’m ever going to be able to walk again.’”
Vasculitis develops when the body’s immune system attacks the blood vessels, leading to inflammation and narrowing of veins, arteries, and small capillaries that can restrict or completely block blood flow.
A year later, in a Chicks in the Office podcast clip posted on Instagram, Kutcher blamed viral, awkward-looking red carpet photos with his Your Place or Mine costar Reese Witherspoon on having partial hearing in one ear.
“I can’t hear very well because I’m hard of hearing in one ear and I can only hear in the other,” he said. “I don’t know who’s yelling my name, but I know there’s a lot of people yelling, going, ‘Reese, Ashton, over here, over here! Look at this one, look at that one!’”
Ted Danson has remained an A-lister ever since he played the hilariously vain bartender Sam Malone on the ’80s sitcom Cheers, going on to star in numerous films and shows, including NBC’s series The Good Place, costarring Kristen Bell. His friendship with Bell and her husband Dax Shepard led to a discovery that both men have psoriatic arthritis.
On a 2018 episode of Shepard’s Armchair Expert podcast, the two compared notes — but mostly laughed about the challenges of their shared condition.
“You’ve hit the right humor vein,” Danson, now 76, told Shepard, “because there is nothing less sexy than turning to your wife and saying, ‘My psoriasis is bothering me.’”
Danson added that psoriatic arthritis "is no fun because it does mess up your joints.," but said he manages his recurring back and hip pain through meditation, breathing exercises, and diet.
“By and large I don’t eat wheats or grasses of any kind,” Danson explained, adding that he tries to consume as much “healthy good fish” and vegetables as he can.
In March 2024, Danson told USA Today that having plaque psoriasis (a skin condition that’s related to psoriatic arthritis) made him feel like a fraud at times.
“People would come up and compliment me or think of me as Sam Malone or whatever, and I was always lying, because part of my brain was going, ‘If only you knew,’” Danson said. “This is not a boohoo moment, meaning life has been very kind to me. I'm so blessed. But it does make you feel like you got to hide something, and that's not a good way to go through life.”
The pop sensation and Only Murders in the Building star Selena Gomez revealed to Billboard magazine in 2015 that she took a break from her world tour at age 21 to undergo chemotherapy treatment for lupus, a chronic autoimmune condition that causes inflammation, pain, and swelling. “I was diagnosed with lupus, and I’ve been through chemotherapy. That’s what my break was really about. … I locked myself away until I was confident and comfortable again.”
Gomez, who is the most followed woman on Instagram, took to the social media site in 2017 to share that complications from her lupus required her to get a kidney transplant.
In an October 2024 Vanity Fair cover story, Gomez, now 32, revealed that due to her medical issues, she won’t be able to carry her own children. “I haven’t ever said this but I unfortunately can’t carry my own children,” she said. “I have a lot of medical issues that would put my life and the baby’s in jeopardy. That was something I had to grieve for a while.”
The 37-year-old lead singer of the band Imagine Dragons has ankylosing spondylitis (AS), a form of inflammatory arthritis that affects the joints, ligaments, and tendons of the spine. Prior to learning of his AS, Reynolds was diagnosed with a type of inflammatory bowel disease called ulcerative colitis when he was 21.
In 2022, Imagine Dragons hit the road to tour again after a three-year hiatus, and he spoke to People magazine about how he was handling the grueling schedule: “I have to live a really, really rigorous lifestyle, very disciplined, in order to keep my body working. Every day I have to exercise to flood all my joints with blood and keep the inflammation down. It's a lot of exercise, like physical therapy–type exercise. Then, I live a really regimented diet — no processed food, very little sugar, a lot of complex carbs. It's like living as an athlete. For me, it keeps me straitlaced. I'm a little prone to wanting to not be straitlaced, so it helps when it's your health on the line.”
In July 2024, Reynolds told Rolling Stone his ankylosing spondylitis still flares at least a couple of times a year, but he usually can get it under control with just a strict diet. “I’ll give myself a shot of a biologic once or twice a year if I’m having a really bad flare. That happens if I’m really stressed or something, and sometimes it’ll be more often than that, but usually with diet and exercise I can keep it under control.”
This Canadian actor, writer, and director, known for her role as the cheerleader Grace Bowman on The Secret Life of the American Teenager, went public about her health condition in 2015, revealing that she’d been living with rheumatoid arthritis since she was a teenager.
“I had all the classic symptoms: extreme joint swelling, different pain, the inability to do certain things that everyone else could,” Park, 38, told People in reference to first being diagnosed. “That’s when I knew that something wasn’t right.”
Despite the common misconception that RA is a disease that only affects elderly people, Park notes, “Rheumatoid arthritis can affect anybody at any age,” adding the disease “ebbs and flows.”
In 2020, Park told the Arthritis Connection that she’s tried a wide range of treatments to manage her symptoms. “Daily medication for a while, lots of physical therapy, diet and exercise modification — I’ve tried it all,” she said.
However, Park added that the disease has not affected her career, and has actually made her a better actor. “I think that it has made me more empathetic toward people’s individual plights, and that has helped me as an actor,” she said.
The former America’s Got Talent host said he was clueless about lupus before he found out he had the disease in 2012, when he was in his early thirties. As the now 44-year-old told HuffPost, “It was super scary because … I knew nothing about it until I was diagnosed.” But four years later, after figuring out how to eat properly and take preventive measures to avoid flare-ups, he said, “I’m healthier now than I’ve ever been before.”
In April 2024, Cannon posted a photo on his Instagram Stories of him getting blood work done, calling himself a “lupus warrior,” according to People.
On the image, he wrote: “Constant reminder that health is the real wealth!!! #lupuswarrior.”
The Grammy Award–winning singer came forward with her lupus diagnosis in 2010. In a May 2023 interview with CBS News, Braxton, now 57, said she’s had some “serious health complications” as a result of the condition.
“Now it's starting to affect my kidneys. ... My skin, my hair, my heart, my vital organs are starting to become affected,” she said. “I love performing. I love touring, but I know I can't do six to seven shows a week. My body's not gonna let me do that. But I always try to find the silver lining. Maybe I can do two to three shows a week.”
In April 2024, during an episode of the She MD podcast, Braxton revealed that she had to terminate a third pregnancy due to health complications from lupus. “I remember the doctor saying, ‘Look at your levels there. You won't survive the pregnancy because of the lupus,’” Toni recalled.
After winning her first round in the U.S. Open tennis tournament at age 31 in the summer of 2011, this tennis legend withdrew from play and announced she had Sjögren’s syndrome, an autoimmune disease that causes extensive dryness, fatigue, and chronic pain. “I had issues with Sjögren’s for a while, it just wasn’t diagnosed,” Williams, now 44, told Good Morning America. “I’ve come to learn that it takes an average of six and a half years to get diagnosed.”
Williams has since become a vegetarian and follows a plant-based and sugar-free diet to help manage symptoms of exhaustion, she told Harper’s Bazaar in a September 2024 interview to promote her new book, Strive, an eight-step program for physical and mental well-being.
The five-time Wimbledon champion with four Olympic gold medals said extreme fatigue has been the most challenging symptom of her disease. “When you crash, you go so hard that you can’t get up, literally,” she said. “But I still got up, because I had to. Lying in bed is not fun. There is no substitute for being well. I had to change my pace.”
Before he wowed audiences with his uncanny portrayals in WeCrashed and House of Gucci, this method actor and musician gained 67 pounds in 2007 to play the role of Mark David Chapman — John Lennon’s assassin — in the movie Chapter 27, which caused him to suffer a possible bout of gout.
“I don't know if it was gout — but I had a definite problem with my feet,” the now 52-year-old told the Daily News. This painful condition is a type of arthritis that causes swollen and stiff joints. Years after he lost the extra pounds, he has honored his vow not to gain weight for a movie role again because he doesn’t want to put his health at risk.
Phil Mickelson, a professional golfer and 2013 British Open champion, started feeling pain near his right ankle that made it hard to walk in the weeks leading up to the 2010 U.S. Open. Then his wrist and fingers began hurting. At first, he chalked the aches and pains up to his rigorous golf training. But when the pain became more widespread and severe in the following days, he sought help. In the week after the U.S. Open, Mickelson was diagnosed with psoriatic arthritis at age 40.
“You cannot believe the excruciating pain. I’m laying on the ground. I can’t roll over. I can’t move. And I’m, like, having these thoughts of ‘how am I going to play golf again?’” Mickelson, now 54, said at the Inc. 5000 conference in November 2023.
He soon began treatment with a biologic drug, which helped him manage the condition.
“I was so lucky, because I got on it right away, so I was able to slow or stop any further damage,” he said.
Mickelson now says he’s been able to manage his condition for years without taking any medications. Instead, he said he stays healthy by eating a healthy diet, intermittent fasting, and drinking coffee with supplements. (Mickelson cofounded a company in 2020 called For Wellness that sells what they call “antioxidant coffee.”) These lifestyle changes may not work for everyone; talk to your doctor before dieting, fasting, or taking any supplements.
“From the first day, the first minute, I got to say, ‘Not only am I competing for the Arthritis Foundation, I have rheumatoid arthritis,’” he has said.
The former physician, now 53, was first diagnosed in late 2002.
“I had just turned 30 and my symptoms started with pain in my right index finger and then spread to my feet, back, and neck,” he tells NIH MedlinePlus magazine. “I was always exhausted and often sleeping up to 14 hours a day. I had been an athlete all my life, but couldn't work out at all and eventually gained 55 pounds.
“The good news is when I started treatment (with a biologic medicine that helps reduce inflammation), it gave me my life back,” he continues.
Iseman said he likes to tell his story to inspire others with the condition.
“I want them to see me, someone who won The Celebrity Apprentice, who hosts American Ninja Warrior, and travels the country doing stand-up comedy,” he said. “I love sharing my story. There is hope. This is a disease you can lead a full life with.”
The Takeaway
There are more than 100 different rheumatic diseases, including lupus, arthritis, and gout.
Many celebrities have rheumatic diseases, from Ted Danson to Selena Gomez to Venus Williams.
A-listers have been open about their rheumatic diseases to inspire others to get diagnosed, seek early treatment, and live their lives to the fullest.
