Plasma therapy at Klinikum Grosshadern: a 15-year retrospective

Immediately after the availability of highly permeable membranes in 1979, membrane plasma separation was introduced as a mode of extracorporeal blood purification by the nephrology group at Klinikum Grosshadern of the Ludwig Maximilians University of Munich (F.R.G.). The new therapy was applied primarily in the management of immunologically mediated renal and extrarenal disorders as well as in paraproteinemias. We also have witnessed a widespread application of this extracorporeal treatment as a last resort in otherwise refractory clinical conditions. Over the years, the group at Grosshadern has contributed to the development, as well as to the laboratory and clinical testing, of new plasma separation membranes, simplified plasmapheresis formats (e.g., spontaneous membrane plasma separation), and several plasma fractionation procedures (e.g., cascade filtration, adsorption). Whenever indicated and possible, plasma fractionation procedures, rather than unselective plasma exchange, are performed in an appropriate clinical situation.