Is Therapeutic Plasma Exchange legal in the United Kingdom?

An established medical procedure that removes plasma and replaces it with albumin. A 347-patient randomised trial in Alzheimer disease met one of two co-primary endpoints, and two small 2025 randomised trials of ageing biomarkers reached opposite conclusions.

Therapeutic plasma exchange is not experimental as a procedure. It is a standard treatment used in neurology, haematology and nephrology, performed with cleared apheresis equipment, in which a volume of the patient's plasma is removed and replaced with albumin, or albumin plus intravenous immunoglobulin.

Mechanism: Two competing accounts, neither settled in humans. The dilution account, developed in mice, holds that removing a fraction of old plasma dilutes age-elevated autoregulatory proteins and resets systemic signalling, and that the replacement fluid is secondary; the 2020 mouse work found that saline plus albumin exchange matched the effects of young blood.

Regulatory history: Therapeutic plasma exchange is an established medical procedure performed with cleared apheresis devices and has recognised indications in neurological, haematological and renal disease. It is not approved for ageing, biological age reduction or Alzheimer disease anywhere.

Licenses medicines for the UK market. A compound without a marketing authorisation is an unlicensed medicine, which can only lawfully be supplied for human use through a prescriber under the specials scheme, not sold as a research product.

The classification above is the The Longevity Archive reading of Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency listings for Therapeutic Plasma Exchange at the reviewed date, not a legal opinion. Rules change, and importing, prescribing and possessing a compound can each be treated differently. Check the regulator directly before acting on anything here.