SKIN, INFLAMMATION AND SULFUROUS WATERS: WHAT IS KNOWN, WHAT IS BELIEVED

One could argue that balneotherapy and mud therapy would have not lasted 2,000 years or so if they
were not effective. No doubt a long history cannot be taken per se as scientific proof of efficacy. Some
empiricism is still present in the field: the concept of spa itself is quite confounding, whereas spring
waters are used for leisure purposes but also for non-acute patient therapy and late phases of clinical
recovery. These confounding elements ultimately feed the opinion of those who aprioristically reject any
potential beneficial effect of balneotherapy: instead, it should at least generate questions that deserve
scientific answers. Clinical practices sequentially integrating pharmacological therapy with those natural
principles for which a sufficient scientific demonstration is available, would probably cut the costs of
public health, generating widespread advantages for the community. Recently, it has become evident
that mineral waters may have intrinsic pharmacological properties. Of the numerous salts dissolved in
thermal waters that might show pharmacological properties, for certain hydrogen sulfide (H2
S) contained
in sulfurous waters is the one that has obtained greater scientific attention, to which should be added
the extensive scientific effort recently dedicated to H2
S as a cellular gasotransmitter, independently from
its natural sources. Dermatology and cosmetics are among the most studied applications of sulfurous
waters, around which, however, some empiricism still confounds opinions: we therefore considered that
a state-of-the-art focus on this topic might be timely and useful for future studies.