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Last fall, “Dr. Pimple Popper” suddenly became a patient herself.

Dr. Sandra Lee, the reality TV dermatologist and surgeon known for tackling ick-inducing skin situations on camera, had a bad day a week before Thanksgiving 2025 while she was taping new episodes of her show at her Upland office.

“I had what I thought was a hot flash. I got super sweaty and didn’t feel like myself,” she told People in an interview published Tuesday. She said she finished the shoot and then headed to her parents’ nearby home, where that evening she experienced shooting pains in one leg and later had trouble navigating down a flight of stairs in the middle of the night.

When she awakened the next day, she said, her left side wasn’t working properly and she was having trouble speaking clearly. It was definitely more than a hot flash.

Her doctor dad — also a dermatologist — told her to get herself to an ER, where she had an MRI that showed evidence of an ischemic stroke, where a vessel supplying blood to the brain gets obstructed. The diagnosis was a shock.

“As a physician I couldn’t deny that I had slurred speech, that I was having weakness on one side,” she said, “but I was like, ‘Well, this is a dream, right?’”

Lee, 55, said unmanaged cholesterol levels and high blood pressure were likely contributors to the stroke, plus the stress of balancing her real-life practice with the demands of “Dr. Pimple Popper.” She returned to production in January, she said, though she was more than a little freaked out.

“I don’t like that I don’t have total control of my left hand or the grip wasn’t as strong. If I feel like I’m not at my best — it’s very scary,” Lee said.

Her neurologist told the outlet that Lee’s symptoms are pretty much gone. Lee said she still notices slight differences when she speaks.

The TV doc is on blood thinners now and is still doing some physical therapy after spending two months post-stroke working through PT and occupational therapy. Lee had to make sure her left hand, among other body parts, was functional and that her balance and movement bounced back.

She does, after all, do precise procedures on camera for the Lifetime audience.

And with new episodes of “Dr. Pimple Popper” set to debut Monday for the first time since 2023, Lee remains fascinated by the people who spend time watching her do extractions and excisions, both on the show and online.

“People watch the videos over and over again because it helps them go to sleep at night,” she told People. But, she added, “Others watch it like it’s a scary movie or a roller coaster.”

AUGUSTA, Ga. — After the career grand slam, a grand entrance.

Rory McIlroy, who last year became the sixth man to win all four major championships, got off to a spectacular start at the Masters on Thursday to claim a share of the lead with a five-under-par 67.

In one sense, the pressure is off. No more wondering about winning a green jacket. Yet he was relieved to feel those familiar butterflies on the first tee.

“Look, we’re playing the first major of the year, it’s the Masters,” he said, having overcome a slightly wobbly start to collect five birdies in his final 11 holes. “If I felt absolutely nothing on that first tee, that’s not a good sign.

“So it was nice to feel my hand shaking a little bit when the tee went into the ground, and struggle to put the ball on top of the tee. So I knew I was feeling it. That’s a good thing. That’s why we want to be here. We want to be able to play our best golf when we’re feeling like that.”

He finished the postcard day tied atop the leaderboard with Sam Burns, who shot his best-ever round at the Masters.

Among those two shots off the lead is 2018 Masters champion Patrick Reed, who said the warm and dry conditions figure to make a difficult course even more challenging.

“It definitely has the teeth in it to make it really, really tough,” Reed said. “The greens are already getting firm, crusty, and bouncy.”

He said the 17th green, typically one of the firmest on the course, is a good example of that.

“I actually broke one tee on the hole trying to fix a ball mark,” he said. “You already know it’s going to get crusty. You know it’s going to get fast, and it’s going to take a lot of patience.”

Some stars struggled. Two-time champion Bubba Watson shot four-over, as did the long-hitting Bryson DeChambeau, who tied for fifth last year.

Said Shane Lowry, who finished two under: “This might be the toughest Masters we’ve played in a while.”

Bryson DeChambeau reacts after his tee shot on the 12th hole Thursday at Augusta National.

(Eric Gay / Associated Press)

There’s something about this storied tournament that can make even the steeliest of players weak in the knees. Mason Howell, the 18-year-old amateur playing with McIlroy, was taking such vicious swings at the ball that his hat came off three times during his round, including on the opening tee.

“That hasn’t happened in a while,” said Howell, who last year became the third-youngest winner of the U.S. Amateur. “I mean, I was going to swing out of my shoes to see if I could cover that right bunker [on No. 1].”

Even the legendary Jack Nicklaus, who won the Masters a record six times, duck-hooked his ceremonial tee shot early Thursday morning, sending it over the head of patrons lining the left side of the downward slope in front of him.

“I got it high enough to hit it about 110 yards over their heads to the left,” said Nicklaus, 86, who won his last green jacket 40 years ago. “I don’t know what was running through my mind other than not hurt anybody.”

Fred Couples, 66, the oldest competitor in the field, went from a tie for eighth to a tie for 43rd … on one hole. He had a nine on the par-five 15th, landing in the water twice.

Couples, who had been two under to that point, finished quadruple bogey, double bogey, double bogey.

Collin Morikawa, who shot a 74 at two over, said he doesn’t feel quite right, physically, although it doesn’t feel like a back issue to him.

“Physically there’s no pain,” he said. “It’s just a trust thing. My legs don’t want to trust that it’s going to hold up the back and the rest of the body. When that’s feeling wobbly, plus you add the adrenaline and the nerves, it’s just not — it’s not easy…”

He called Thursday “the toughest round I’ve ever played,” and said he could not remember waking up quite as nervous as he was before the start of this tournament.

“I honestly didn’t know if I was going to make contact,” he said.

Rory McIlroy plays a shot from the 12th tee during the first round of the Masters on Thursday.

(Maddie Meyer / Getty Images)

McIlroy, playing in his 18th Masters, said he leaned heavily on his experience to maintain an even keel. A year ago, he had two double-bogeys on Thursday, and two more on Sunday, yet never panicked.

So this time, when he found himself hitting out the trees on some early holes, he resisted the urge to get too “guide-y” on his shots and instead kept swinging away.

“Even though I wasn’t hitting fairways the first few holes, I still kept swinging,” he said. “I didn’t try to get the tee down and hit fairway finders. I just trusted that eventually I’ll start to make some good swings. So that was a little bit different.”

The biggest difference? What he achieved a year ago.

“It’s easier for me,” McIlroy said, “to make those swings and not worry about where it goes when I know that I can go to the Champions Locker Room and put my green jacket on and have a Coke Zero at the end of the day.”

Alex Killorn broke a tie off a scramble at 9:09 of the second period, Lukas Dostal stopped 29 shots and the Ducks beat the Utah Mammoth 4-1 on Friday night to pad their Pacific Division lead.

After the puck was cleared off the goal line behind goalie Vitek Vanecek, the Ducks’ Beckett Sennecke ended up with it on the left side and slipped a pass to Killorn for a shot before Vanecek was set. Killorn also had two assists.

Ryan Poehling, Cutter Gauthier and Mikael Granlund also scored to help the Ducks — playing without suspended defenseman Radko Gudas — rebound from a 3-2 overtime loss to Philadelphia on Wednesday night at home. They moved three points ahead of Edmonton in the division.

Gudas served the fourth game of a five-game suspension for kneeing Auston Matthews in a loss at Toronto on March 12. Matthews tore the medial collateral ligament in his left knee and will miss the rest of the season.

Poehling tied it with 6:23 left in the first, beating Vanecek with a nifty move on a shorthanded break. Poehling took a pass from Killorn, sped down the left side, cut right and shot against the grain to the left.

The Ducks (38-27-4) put it away with two empty-net goals, with Gauthier scoring his 36th goal on the first.

Dylan Guenther scored his 34th goal of the season for Utah — at 1:48 of the first of the Mammoth’s second shot on goal.

Utah remained six points ahead of the Kings for the first wild-card spot in the Western Conference.

The Mammoth (36-28-6) opened a four-game homestand. They had won two straight on the road, beating Dallas 6-3 on Monday night to snap a four-game losing streak and topping Vegas 4-0 Thursday night.

Up next for the Ducks: vs. Buffalo at Honda Center on Sunday.