Christina Applegate has revealed that she was misdiagnosed with multiple sclerosis, more than five years after publicly announcing that she had been diagnosed with the disease.
The 54-year-old actress shared the news during an episode of MeSsy, the podcast she co-hosts with actress Jamie-Lynn Sigler, who has lived with MS for more than two decades. Applegate said she had recently stepped away from the podcast while processing the unexpected change in her diagnosis.
According to Applegate, questions about her diagnosis emerged after her doctor took her off an infusion treatment to monitor how her B cells responded. When the expected changes did not occur, doctors began taking another look at her condition.
“She came into my room and said, ‘Congratulations, you don’t have MS,’” Applegate recalled. “I was, like, not happy at all. Everybody else was so happy.”
Despite no longer being diagnosed with MS, Applegate stressed that her health problems have not disappeared. She continues to experience serious symptoms affecting her mobility and daily life and said her condition has actually worsened.
“You don’t get misdiagnosed and then all of the sudden I’m better,” she said. “If anything, I’ve gotten worse. So I’m back at square one where I don’t know what’s going on with me.”
Applegate said her doctors will now investigate what has been causing the symptoms she has experienced since 2021. She currently undergoes physical therapy three times a week.
The Dead to Me star initially revealed her MS diagnosis in August 2021. She later spoke openly about experiencing numbness, tingling and balance problems and said she needed a cane and sometimes a wheelchair because of her mobility issues. Production on the final season of Dead to Me was temporarily halted following her original diagnosis, with accommodations made when filming resumed.
Applegate subsequently became a prominent advocate for people living with MS. She said learning that diagnosis was incorrect has left her struggling with complicated emotions, including feeling as though she had somehow disappointed people who followed her experience.
“It’s very unnerving and it’s really confusing for me,” Applegate said.
Dr. Marwa Kaisey, an associate professor of neurology at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center who appeared on the podcast, explained that MS misdiagnosis is not uncommon. Unlike some illnesses, there is no single definitive test for multiple sclerosis, and doctors instead rely on a combination of clinical symptoms, imaging and other diagnostic criteria. Kaisey said nearly one in five people who have been told they have MS ultimately may not have the disease.
Applegate said she underwent both MRIs and a spinal tap during her original diagnostic process, with scans showing lesions on her brain. Her doctors are expected to begin a new investigation into the cause of her symptoms next week.
Source: CBS News