All Of Sarah Hyland's Health Issues Explained

When she was still a teenager, actor Sarah Hyland was cast as Haley Dunphy on a little show called "Modern Family." While Haley was a typical high school kid dealing with typical high school kid drama, in real life, Hyland was dealing with some very serious health issues that often interfered with her ability to work. However, she refused to slow down, even when she was completely exhausted. "I never really said no," Hyland explained on a 2022 episode of "Quitters," a podcast hosted by fellow "Modern Family" star Julie Bowen. "There are some episodes of 'Modern Family' where I do not remember filming because I was asleep," Hyland revealed.

Tragically, Sarah Hyland has experienced significant health problems throughout her entire life. She suffered from kidney dysplasia which led to a host of surgeries, including two kidney transplants. There were complications, due in part to Hyland's diagnoses of endometriosis as well as a hernia. While Hyland seems to live a lavish life and looks bright-eyed and breezy on TV, her journey has been anything but easy.

In the years since "Modern Family" wrapped, Sarah Hyland has been open about what she has gone through for the sake of her own health and well-being. Read on to learn all about the untold truth of Sarah Hyland's health issues, procedures, and treatments.

Sarah Hyland's health issues began before she was even born. Hyland has kidney dysplasia, a condition that develops in the womb. Dr. Gowri Rocco, who specializes in women's health, explains to The List, "Kidney dysplasia is when the kidneys didn't form properly before birth. This leads to cysts that make it hard or impossible to filter waste from the body. In some cases, it doesn't cause major problems but in others (like Sarah's) it can lead to kidney failure."

The complications caused by Hyland's kidney dysplasia led to her having many surgeries while she was just a young child. "Most of the surgeries that I had were before I was 4, so ... at least that's kind of in a distant memory," the actor shared on a 2019 episode of "Good Morning America."

The "Modern Family" star has not been shy about showing her various surgical scars, and a throwback pic on Instagram revealed that at least one of those scars was present even when she was a baby. Hyland posted an adorable photo of herself as a toddler rocking a cape and a diaper with a visible scar on her abdomen. While it's sad to understand she had to go through scary medical procedures at such a young age, Hyland brought some levity to the situation, captioning the post, "It's called FASHION Brenda. Look it up. #tbt #showyourscars."

Kidney dysplasia is not a rare condition, affecting an estimated 1 in 4,000 people. While Sarah Hyland's case was a serious one, the condition doesn't always cause health problems and often only involves one kidney. But Sarah experienced pain and fatigue on a daily basis, even as she starred as Haley Dunphy on "Modern Family." "I try and make it so that Haley's always sitting down," Sarah shared during a 2012 interview with ABC News. "I've definitely worked it in ... when Haley walks up the stairs that's like my workout for the week," the actor revealed.

Sarah's health continued to decline, and by the time she was 21 years old, it was clear she needed a kidney transplant. Luckily, she was able to find a donor, her own father, actor Edward James Hyland. "You know that family is going to be there for you no matter what. My dad gave me a freakin' kidney!" Sarah shared with Seventeen in 2012. She also expressed her gratitude for her friends and her "Modern Family" co-stars who helped her through the difficult healing process. "[Y]ou really find out what kind of people you're friends with. It was just amazing, and it really opened my eyes to see who's there for me and who's not," Sarah said.

While it appeared that Sarah Hyland had gotten a new lease on life thanks to her kidney transplant, the actor's health began to take a turn for the worse several years after the surgery. In 2016, Hyland began experiencing exhaustion, fevers, and dealing with infections, symptoms that pointed to a heartbreaking reality: her body was rejecting her new kidney. "When you have an organ transplant, it's basically a foreign thing in your body," she explained in a 2018 interview with Self. "Your immune system will want to attack it."

For months the actor underwent many tests and endured multiple hospital stays in an effort to save the kidney, and in 2017 she began dialysis treatment, a process wherein a machine does the work of filtering waste from the blood when the kidneys are not healthy enough to do so. Hyland continued to work during this time, but her health problems and their treatments were taking a toll. She experienced side effects of the immunosuppressant medications she was taking, such as facial swelling, which was not uncommon. "These medications do their job but they can also affect your energy, your weight, your skin even your mood," Dr. Gowri Rocco tells The List.

While Sarah Hyland was undergoing dialysis in order to try to save her kidney, she dealt with some very unpleasant side effects of the treatment such as water retention that was serious enough to require medication. Unfortunately, the medication Hyland was taking caused her to develop gout, a form of arthritis that causes pain and swelling in the joints. "I was on dialysis, I had gout. It was wild," Hyland revealed on a 2023 episode of the "Dinner's on Me with Jesse Tyler Ferguson" podcast. She shared that she was in a tremendous amount of pain and had to use crutches on the set of "Modern Family." 

Looking back at this challenging period, Hyland and Jesse Tyler Ferguson remembered one "Modern Family" scene in particular where their characters tried to push a car together. In the scene, Hyland's character wore heels even though Hyland was suffering from gout in real life. This shoe choice was not the actor's idea; she noted that the producers "insisted" she wear the pumps.

Gout was not the only difficult condition Hyland experienced while undergoing dialysis. The actor also developed sciatic back pain as well as changes to her vision brought on by a blood pressure spike.

Eventually, dialysis was not enough to maintain Sarah Hyland's health, and it was determined that she would need to undergo a second kidney transplant. The process would involve not one but two surgeries, the first to remove the kidney her body rejected and the second to transplant the new kidney. Luckily, Hyland was able to find another match, again within her immediate family, as her younger brother Ian would be able to donate a kidney to his big sister. "When Sarah first told me that she would need a second transplant, the initial wave of fear was washed over by a sense of resolution," Ian shared with Self in 2018. "I probably would have insisted on donating even if I wasn't a match."

Hyland had her first transplanted kidney removed in May 2017. In September that same year she had her second transplant surgery. Hyland described her second surgery while showing off her scars, telling Self, "[T]he second transplant they put it on the other side ... when they do a kidney transplant, they connect the new kidney to your old kidneys in the front and it sticks out." As a result of the kidney placement, Hyland showed where she had a small bulge in her abdomen, and admitted it was difficult to show that part of her body. But ultimately, Hyland seemed proud of her scars, explaining, "I think personally for someone so tiny to have a stomach that looks like the New Jersey Turnpike just shows who I am and what kind of character I have."

Although Sarah Hyland's second kidney transplant saved her life, it came with a lot of fear and complicated feelings, especially after all she'd already been through. Hyland was scarred emotionally from the failure of her first kidney transplant, something that she took to heart. "When a family member gives you a second chance at life, and it fails, it almost feels like it's your fault," Hyland revealed to Self in 2018. "I was very depressed."

Sadly, Hyland's health issues had taken such a toll that she even considered taking her own life. "For a long time, I was contemplating suicide, because I didn't want to fail my little brother like I failed my dad," she confessed. Along with her guilt and fear, Hyland also expressed concern that she'd been "a burden" to her family and friends, as she had grown up always needing extra care. Thankfully, Hyland was able to reach out to someone and eventually get the help she needed to get back to a healthier mental space, and she encourages others who are struggling to do the same. "For anybody that wants to reach out to somebody but doesn't really know how .... it's not a shameful thing to say," Hyland shared.

If you or someone you know is struggling or in crisis, help is available. Call or text 988 or chat 988lifeline.org

In addition to the health issues Sarah Hyland experienced as a result of her kidney dysplasia, she was also diagnosed with yet another condition called endometriosis. As Dr. Gowri Rocco explains to The List, "It's an incredibly painful condition where tissue that acts like the uterine lining grows outside the uterus. Laparoscopic surgery can remove some of it but it's often not the whole answer."

For Hyland, one laparoscopic surgery was indeed not enough to get rid of the painful lesions caused by endometriosis, and she continued to have flare-ups that left her unable to do more than curl up into the fetal position. "It has been hard to stand up straight, let alone work," Hyland told Self, describing her agonizing pain. The actor was aware that another surgery could bring some relief, but first she'd have to endure the extreme discomfort of the procedure itself. "Laparoscopic [surgery is] one of the most painful things I've ever been through in my life," she said, noting that the recovery was especially difficult.

According to Dr. Rocco, a whole-body approach, including a focus on nutrition, gut health, and lifestyle, can be helpful in balancing hormones and quelling the pain caused by endometriosis. "Endo takes a toll on both the body and the spirit, so it's important to treat both," she shares with The List.

Sarah Hyland had successfully recovered from her second kidney transplant by 2018, but her health woes continued. Following her second transplant surgery, Hyland was in a lot of pain, some of which was caused by an abdominal hernia. As Jason Singh, MD, explains, "Abdominal hernias occur when internal organs push through weakened muscle walls due to compromised connective tissue integrity or increased abdominal pressure." Dr. Singh also tells The List that symptoms of hernias can be mistaken for other conditions, thus often going undetected. Dr. Gowri Rocco shares a similar sentiment, noting that a hernia can go unnoticed. "Especially if someone is already dealing with other pain or recovery," she adds.

It is unclear when exactly Hyland's hernia was diagnosed but according to the actor it was exacerbated by a motor vehicle collision. "We got in a car accident in 'Modern' and it made it like 500 times worse," she explained in a 2018 video for Self. Hyland's hernia repair surgery took place after she had recovered from her second transplant, but hernia surgery is not exactly simple. "[T]he protruding tissue is returned to its proper position and the weakened area reinforced with sutures or synthetic mesh that provides a scaffold for tissue ingrowth," Dr. Singh explains to The List.

Sarah Hyland has been through a lot in terms of her health, and she has the scars to prove it. But while Hyland has been open about showing off her scars, they presented some problems that were more than merely cosmetic. According to Hyland, she accidentally burned herself when using a heating pad to soothe the pain from one of her many conditions. "I was in so much pain from the hernia that I had a heating pack on, and because I have so many scars down there, I'm numb, and I didn't realize, and I got a [really bad] burn," she told Self, adding, "It was this huge blister."

The burn presented even more of a problem as Hyland was scheduled to undergo laparoscopic surgery for her endometriosis and hernia repair surgery at the same time, but had to postpone the latter until the burn healed. "So, we did the endometriosis surgery first, and then a couple weeks later, we did [the other one]," the actor explained. By that point, Hyland had gone under the knife so many times it was difficult to keep track. "I would say at least 16 surgeries in ... 27 years," she told Self in 2018.