Reality television personality Brandi Glanville, 53, is undergoing what she calls “exploratory surgery” on her face Friday after four years of unexplained health problems that she says have drained her savings and exposed holes in her health insurance coverage.
Glanville discussed the upcoming procedure on the Oct. 22 episode of her podcast, “Brandi Glanville Unfiltered,” saying surgeon Dr. Carlo Honrado will operate to “power wash” beneath her skin and investigate two specific areas doctors believe contain either fungal masses or something else entirely.
“Dr. Carlo Honrado is taking my face off on Friday and going to do an exploratory surgery to kind of do a power wash under my skin. And then he knows where there’s two definite spots, like either fungal balls or something alive. I think it’s alive personally cause it moves when it wants.”
Glanville said she has never had facial surgery before and has been told this procedure is more invasive than a standard facelift, leaving her “super excited” but “scared to death.” She said she is paying roughly $5,000 out of pocket for the operation, reasoning that the cost is worth it if the surgery finally resolves the issue.
“It started in my face, my cheek and my jawbone, and then it went over my head back in my neck. Now it’s down my spine,” she said, adding that her doctor believes removing the source in her head could make treating the rest of the condition more manageable.
A years-long medical mystery
Glanville has said she believes she contracted a parasite during a 2023 trip to Morocco. She initially suffered facial paralysis and was diagnosed with stress-induced angioedema. In September, she disclosed a broader set of diagnoses, including highly resistant ESBL Klebsiella and Enterobacter with biofilm, coccidioidomycosis (Valley fever), Demodex dermatitis and mononucleosis. She said her treatment now includes daily IV infusions costing an estimated $3,300 to $6,000 a month.
Insurance, debt and a broken system
In a recent interview with Fox News Digital, Glanville said financial pressure from years of medical spending is why she agreed to compete on the current season of “Special Forces.” She was sharply critical of the insurance system that she says left her to cover the costs herself.
“The medical system here is broken. So I have, like, from 8 a.m. on, I have creditors from, like, medical things calling me, like from Cedars-Sinai. It’s out of control. Like I spent hundreds of thousands of dollars that I had saved. I emptied my 401(k). And it’s all for medical bills. And I had insurance, and they told me nothing was wrong. I’m so angry. You know, going into my mid-fifties I had a cushion and that’s gone. So it’s very scary right now.”
Glanville added that beyond the financial strain, she took the reality competition show as a chance to prove to herself she could still push through adversity. “I just want this s— out of my body,” she wrote in September. “I want my health back. I want my life back. I want to feel like me again.”
