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Therapeutic Plasma Exchange

Renal and Transfusion Therapy

Therapeutic plasma exchange, or plasmapheresis, is an extracorporeal procedure that removes a patient's blood plasma, or specific components of it, and returns or exchanges it, replacing the removed plasma with donor plasma, albumin or saline. The technique treats immune-mediated disorders including Goodpasture syndrome, Guillain-Barre syndrome, lupus, myasthenia gravis and thrombotic thrombocytopenic purpura, as well as conditions caused by excess blood proteins such as hyperviscosity syndrome. Russian physicians first described the technique in 1913 and American physicians in 1914, working with animal subjects; Josep Antoni Grifols-Lucas carried out the first systematic human study in 1951, showing donors could safely undergo the procedure weekly, and the modern automated process was developed at the United States National Cancer Institute between 1963 and 1968, with Victor Grifols-Lucas patenting an automated in-situ device in 1965 that made the procedure safer and more efficient.

Facts
Classification
Status
Standard of Care 1
Origin Year
1959 1
Connections

Treats

Sources
1. Wikipedia
Wikipedia contributors, Wikimedia Foundation
  • Therapeutic plasma exchange article, History section
    Michael Rubinstein was the first to use plasmapheresis to treat an immune-related disorder when he saved the life of an adolescent boy with thrombotic thrombocytopenic purpura (TTP) at the Cedars of Lebanon Hospital in Los Angeles in 1959.
  • https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plasmapheresis, lead section
    Plasmapheresis is the removal, treatment, and return or exchange of blood plasma or components thereof from and to the blood circulation.
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