by doctors co tui, f.c. bartter and a.m. wright in 1944. aware of the rising demand for plasma for transfusion, dr. josep antoni grífols-lucas conducted the first systematic study of the application of plasmapheresis in a series of plasma donors. performed in 1951, this was the most exhaustive study to date of the medium-term effects on the human body, and involved more than 320 plasmapheresis procedures. grifols-lucas concluded that it was possible for donors to undergo plasmapheresis on a weekly basis without the quality of their plasma suffering, while the method also made it possible to obtain a larger quantity of plasma when compared to the conventional method of whole blood donation. the results of the study were presented at the 4th international congress of blood transfusion in lisbon (1951), and were published in 1952 in the british medical journal and medicina clínica in spain. at the lisbon congress, grifols-lucas met edwin cohn. while grifols-lucas was presenting a safe technique for obtaining large quantities of plasma from healthy donors, cohn presented a plasma fractionator, a device that separated out the proteins contained in plasma. these two major contributions marked the birth of a new industry: plasma fractionation to obtain plasma products. in 1955, further data were presented at the 5th congress of the european hematology society, in freiburg, germany, based on the ongoing performance of plasmapheresis over a five-year period. in 1956 grifols-lucas presented the results at the 6th congress of the international hematology society in boston, us. 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. the modern plasmapheresis process itself originated in the u.s. national cancer institute between 1963 and 1968, where investigators drew upon an old dairy creamer separation technology first used in 1878 and refined by edwin cohn's centrifuge marketed in 1953. in 1965, dr. víctor grifols-lucas, brother of josep antoni grifols-lucas, patented the device, along with the procedure for performing plasmapheresis in situ, that is, with the donor present. this replaced a fragmented, manual process with a continuous automatic method which enabled blood components to be extracted, separated and returned to the donor in a single procedure. the new device made plasmapheresis faster and simpler, and also made it safer for donors.