The ultra-rich have locked themselves in oxygen chambers, infused their bodies with stem cells and undergone whole-body MRIs in pursuit of a longer and healthier life.
But now, they’ve started a new trend: Paying up to $10,000-a-go to have microplastics and toxins filtered out of their blood.
In the last six months, Orlando Bloom, former Dallas Cowboys quarterback Troy Aikman and Star Trek actor Paul Wesley have all posted snaps of themselves having the procedure.
While, in October last year, biohacking mogul Bryan Johnson revealed he had tried the treatment, after previously swapping his plasma, a component of blood, with that of his then 17-year-old son.
In the procedure, known as plasmapharesis or therapeutic plasma exchange (TPE), patients are hooked up to a machine that filters plasma out of their blood and replaces it with albumin, the most abundant protein in the blood.
Blood plasma can contain inflammation-causing proteins, microplastics, forever chemicals and other potentially harmful substances. The albumin replaced the plasma and does not contain these toxins
After removing the plasma in the procedure, patients claim it has left them feeling ‘incredible’ and ‘more relaxed’. But TPE’s effects, especially on aging, are not backed by rigorous scientific studies.
Some research has suggested that the procedure may even boost the number of microplastics in the blood because the machines used typically contain plastic components that can shed microplastics directly into the bloodstream.
Orlando Bloom, 48, is shown above undergoing a blood plasma filtering therapy that costs $12,700 at a clinic in London
Microplastics and forever chemicals enter the body mainly through ingestion, eating a food that contains them, or inhalation, breathing them in. They can accumulate in body tissue and have previously been linked to health effects including inflammation, disrupted gut microbiome and altered hormone responses.
Doctors warn that higher levels of inflammation in the body and problems with hormones and the gut microbiome can cause damaging mutations to accumulate in cells, speeding up the pace of aging.
Bloom, 48, revealed he had tried blood plasma filtering in June, writing on Instagram: ‘Thanks for the help @clarifyclinics. A new way of removing microplastics and toxic chemicals from our bodies.’
Clarify Clinics offers a similar procedure to TPE, costing $12,700, but its method filters the patient’s own plasma of toxins before returning it.
Johnson, 48, though he claims to be more than a decade younger biologically, said he underwent TPE to ‘remove toxins from my body’, and wrote on X after the procedure: ‘The operator, who’s been doing TPE for nine years, said my plasma is the cleanest he’s ever seen. By far. He couldn’t get over it.’
TPE takes around two to three hours to complete and requires patients to sit in a chair with an IV in both arms.
During the procedure, the machine removes about 75 percent of plasma, about two out of the 2.7liters of plasma an adult is estimated to have. Overall, adults have between 4.7 and 5.7liters of total blood in their bodies.
Effects from the treatment appear over the days afterward, doctors say, arguing that it can support longevity, the immune system and boost cell health.
Bryan Johnson, also 48, is shown above after trying TPE in October last year. He is holding a sack containing the blood plasma that was filtered out of his body
Former Dallas Cowboys quarterback Troy Aikman has also tried TPE. He is pictured above receiving the procedure in August
Celebrities who did the procedure were not so clear on its effects, however.
Johnson admitted that it had little effect. In an Instagram video, he said: ‘So, what happened [to me] when you removed the plasma from your body? Nothing really. I felt the same, went to bed, slept the same. So, for me, it was pretty inconsequential.’
Patients are encouraged to get the procedure twice yearly, leading to a total annual cost of around $20,000.
Dr Keith Smigiel, an Arizona-based doctor who offers the procedure, told the New York Post that patients say the sensation after the procedure is equivalent to a ‘cross-country flight’ with a ‘jet lag’ sensation at the end.
Johnson and other longevity enthusiasts spend countless hours optimizing their biomarkers, which may have affected the health effects of TPE.
In other individuals who do not follow the same rigid regimens, however, there is some anecdotal evidence that the procedure may help.
California-based health coach Natalia Naila took her Russian-born mother, Venera, 67, for TPE and said that the treatment boosted her health.
She told the Wellness is Life podcast: ‘She felt incredible, very light, clear and noticeably more relaxed.
‘I stayed with her for two nights at the hotel and I observed that she slept much deeper and more quietly than she had before.’
Some side effects were reported, such as bruising where the needles were placed, itching around her nose and increased urination, but Naila said her mother was keen to try the procedure again.
Dr Rosa Busquets, a forensic chemist at Kingston University, and Dr Luiza Campos, an environmental engineering expert at University College London, both based in the UK, wrote on The Conversation in July that TPE was similar to dialysis, a life-saving treatment for patients with kidney failure where waste is filtered out of the blood.
Shown above is Natalia Naila and her mother Venera, 67, who received TPE. Afterward, Naila said her mother felt ‘incredible’ and slept ‘much deeper’ than previously
Bloom is pictured above in Los Angeles, California, in October this year
They wrote: ‘Dialysis filters waste products like urea and creatinine from the blood, regulates electrolytes, removes excess fluid and helps maintain blood pressure.’
But they warned, however, that claims that TPE could filter microplastics or other toxic compounds out of the blood were unproven.
They said: ‘It’s tempting to believe, as Bloom seems to, that we can simply “clean” the blood, like draining pasta or purifying drinking water.
‘Currently, there is no published scientific evidence that microplastics can be effectively filtered from human blood. So, claims that dialysis or other treatments can remove them should be viewed with skepticism, especially when the filtration systems themselves are made from plastic.’
The doctors added: ‘While it’s tempting to chase quick fixes or celebrity-endorsed cleanses, we are still in the early stages of understanding what microplastics are doing to our bodies, and how to get rid of them.’
TPE has previously been used to treat certain autoimmune conditions, helping to remove antibodies from the blood that could be triggering the immune system to attack the body.
There are an estimated 17,000 TPE procedures carried out in hospitals every year in the US, although these are for sick patients. It is not clear how many people are receiving the treatment out-of-pocket.
