A medical procedure usually reserved for lowering stubbornly high cholesterol may have another effect, reducing some of the "forever chemicals" that remain in the bloodstream.
Results from a German study now suggest that this "blood-cleaning" approach can lower certain toxic substances that are both widespread and difficult for the body to clear.
What happened?
The researchers focused on apheresis, a treatment used for patients whose cholesterol is hard to control, and found signs that it may also decrease levels of several PFAS, which stands for per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances.
At the Technical University of Dresden in Germany, described as the world's largest apheresis center, doctors carry out as many as 10,000 of these procedures each year, per AOL.
During these treatments, blood is taken from one arm, fat molecules are filtered from the plasma, and the processed blood is then returned through the other arm.
To find out whether the system was trapping anything beyond blood fats, the team analyzed the contents of used apheresis bags.
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In 34 patients who underwent two sessions of double-filtration plasmapheresis, low-density lipoprotein cholesterol dropped as expected. But the researchers also recorded apparent reductions of up to 25% in four forever chemicals. These included perfluorohexane sulfonic acid, perfluorononanoic acid, perfluorooctane sulfonic acid, and perfluorooctanoic acid.
Stefan R. Bornstein, an author of the study published in the peer-reviewed journal Brain Health, told AOL, "When we finally asked what else was leaving the circulation, two independent laboratories found the same compounds falling in the plasma."
Why does it matter?
Known as forever chemicals because they resist breaking down, PFAS have been used in items including nonstick coatings, firefighting foams, and stain-resistant fabrics. Earlier studies detected them in the blood of more than 90% of people worldwide, and drinking water is a major source of exposure.
If a hospital-based treatment can safely reduce PFAS in the blood, it could one day help people with especially high exposure levels or elevated health risks.
Researchers also investigated whether the same process might remove microplastics, though they said the results were not strong enough to support that conclusion.
The scientists themselves described the significance of the research, writing, "These findings could serve as clinical surrogates to guide treatment… of therapeutic apheresis in mitigating health risks associated with environmental pollutants. While larger, well-designed clinical trials are needed to confirm these benefits, these early results could lay the groundwork for future research and clinical applications."
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