Playboy alum Jenny McCarthy said she finally has an answer to a months-long health ordeal that left her dealing with repeated infections, surgeries, and unusual symptoms, including growths on her eyes.
Speaking on the March 31 episode of the "Heal Squad" podcast, McCarthy said doctors ultimately traced the issue to mold exposure after earlier treatments failed to resolve her condition.
Recalling what she was told, she said, "'The reason why you're having constant infections, your body won't heal, you're oozing things, is because you have mold.'"
According to McCarthy, her doctor explained that her already fragile immune system made her especially vulnerable to "mycotoxins poisoning."
"These mycotoxins bury themselves underneath microfilm in your gut and in your nose," she said, adding, "they go hide out there and they hang out there."
The diagnosis came in December, after what she described as months of unsuccessful interventions.
She began a treatment plan earlier this year that she expects to last about a year.
"I started in January," she said. "I'm in month three. I'll probably have to go a year of it."
Her current regimen includes a nasal spray, roughly "a hundred supplements" and extracorporeal blood oxygenation and ozonation (EBOO), a process in which blood is drawn, filtered, and returned to the body.
While the treatment is extensive, McCarthy said having an explanation brought relief.
"I also felt relieved because I also knew why," she said.
The health issues appear to have started with a dental problem.
McCarthy said a root canal procedure left an infection that continued to spread.
"It didn't get cleaned out all the way," she said. "There was infection left in there and bone grafted on top of it, so I went on my merry way with now an infection brewing in my bone."
That later developed into what she described as a jawbone infection.
From there, the situation worsened as the infection affected her eyes, leading to repeated surgeries.
"I'm on surgery number eight and I started getting these growths on my eye," she said. "It looked like the nastiest white head. A puss-filled eraser top. I'm like, 'What the heck is this?' They're like, 'You're not watching your eyes enough.' And I'm like, 'Bulls--t.' I had to have it surgically removed. Four weeks later, it grew back."
McCarthy said it was her functional medicine doctor who pushed for further testing.
She recalled being told, "'Okay hold on, you're the healthiest patient I have,'" followed by, "'We've got to dig deeper.' She goes, 'I'm going to test you for mold.'"
She previously spoke about the situation in a November 2025 interview with People, describing how the infections escalated.
"I had one infection that turned into another and another, and then I had these growths show up on my eyeballs," she said. "My teeth were falling out, implants falling out."
At the time, she said she had undergone nine surgeries, been "on antibiotics for a year" and was "eating soft foods only," adding, "People should actually feel a little sorry for me."
Zoe Papadakis ✉
Zoe Papadakis is a Newsmax writer based in South Africa with two decades of experience specializing in media and entertainment. She has been in the news industry as a reporter, writer and editor for newspapers, magazine and websites.
© 2026 Newsmax. All rights reserved.