Talk:Balneotherapy

Talk

No, don't merge, they are distinct. Hydrotherapy involves heat as the therapeutic agent and balneotherapy relies on the substances in the water. The former is an accepted medical treatment and the latter is a spa therapy. THB 04:21, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Since most oppose the merger, with good arguments (see Talk:Hydrotherapy/Archive 1#Merger_proposal), and no discussion is going on for the last three months, I removed the merge template. Kraaiennest (talk) 00:49, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Huh?

The suggestion that spas are placebo seems extremely weird? Many thermal springs have been in use since antiquity and people wouldn't sit many boring hours in the water if it wasn't useful for health.

Furthermore, mankind once lived in water, as can be seen from the direction of natural hair orientation on the arms and legs, thus it seems only logical that a temporal return to that lifestyle would have health benefits. 82.131.210.163 (talk) 16:59, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Seems like a reference to the aquatic ape theory, which is unfounded and considered debunked by anthropologists. 71.76.146.141 (talk) 21:03, 9 February 2025 (UTC)

Needs Rewrite - Neutral Point of View

This article needs a makeover. I'd argue that it's a long way from Neutral Point Of View. It does little more than claim that Balneotherapy is a scam.

There's been good research lately that largely supports therapeutic claims. I've been looking into this so I can add to the article on Holy Wells. So please take a look at the following (and reply with opinions):
A novel “hot spring”-mimetic hydrogel with excellent angiogenic properties for chronic wound healing
Physicochemical and metagenomic analysis of samples from the Roman Baths (Bath, UK) reveals high bacterial and archaeal diversity and a potential for antimicrobial discovery
Screening and isolation of microbes from a Mud Community of Ischia Island Thermal Springs: preliminary analysis of a bioactive compound
Bioactivities and molecular networking-based elucidation of metabolites of potent actinobacterial strains isolated from the Unkeshwar geothermal springs in India ~2026-20491-90 (talk) 00:24, 3 April 2026 (UTC)

I doubt there would be support to remove "pseudoscience" per WP's guidelines on fringe theories WP:FRINGE. However I'm pretty sure there's been serious medical and scientific studies out of Japan and Germany in relation to health. All sources would need to meet WP:MEDRS standards. Perhaps consider adding a section, on "scientific research" or something like that? Netherzone (talk) 02:00, 3 April 2026 (UTC)

I won't make changes to this article myself. My background's in Chemistry, not Medicine (plus I've a lot on my plate). I still feel this article should read more like the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica article (Reference 3). From the Wikipedia editing I've done I can see how easy it is to cherry pick citations from credible sources to support a particular point of view. I feel that's the case here.

The article focuses almost exclusively on a probably bogus claim that balneotherapy is good for arthritis (References 7 & 8). But - here's the kicker - Reference 9 pretty much only looked at the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis & chronic pain caused by other musculoskeletal diseases (see its summary) - yet that reference is then used to discredit the "efficacy of balneotherapy" as a whole.

What I've dug up suggests this treatment is likely to be useful for skin infections and wound healing. Ferrous ions (Fe2+) dissolved in water can supercharge the growth of "good bacteria" in a hot spring environment. The result can be regarded as probiotics in a topical medication. There's even suggestions that the Iron in spring water may have a direct effect through the formation of "reactive oxygen species" - part of the immune response in many organisms. Iron has been trialed as such in wastewater treatment - where it "presented a striking disinfection behavior in comparison with other widespread disinfection technologies such as chlorination".

Anyway - that's it. Now I want to go back to researching the dog as a companion animal to many ancient healing gods. Hopefully an editor with some medical knowledge will read this and reassess the article. ~2026-20491-90 (talk) 04:28, 4 April 2026 (UTC)

@EmergentAnarchy: I think this would be a good place for this. I saw you reversed my edit. How about we discuss and come to some sort of agreement. Here is my thinking when I made the change:

A few different issues

First off I do believe a skeptical tone is good and proper because the topic is currently an open question, and there is bogus science in marketing materials.

My issue is with the use of term pseudoscience without any qualifiers to describe a very heterogenous topic composed of all these different treatments for different ailments through different supposed pathways. It’s not like Flat Earth or thinking that vaccines cause autism where there’s a central doctrine that the whole ecosystem of claims hinges on. In many cases the only similarity between different things called “balneotherapy” is the presence of water.

There’s a logical/ definition issue because pseudoscience is being applied as if it means "probably bullshit" or even “doubted by mainstream science”. But even if all claims conceivably falling under the term were false, it is still being investigated in a legitimate scientific way. There have been numerous peer-reviewed studies including randomized trials that formulate falsifiable claims, use recognized scientific methods, assess bias, and explicitly acknowledge their limitations. This is discussion taking place within mainstream science. So the term pseudoscience is not exactly appropriate on the grounds of definition.

There’s also an epistemological problem. To reasonably claim knowledge that the field as a whole is pseudoscience requires an extremely high burden of proof. As previously mentioned many of its claims are almost unrelated to eachother. Case by case descriptions are more appropriate, but an unqualified classification of the entire category is really hard to justify. To truly claim “all of these things are pseudoscience” would take, well, knowing that all of those things are pseudoscience.

No recent scientists who have studied it go this far. It is acknowledged as controversial, postulated as because “biological mechanisms underlying these benefits have not yet been completely elucidated”( https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6032246/). Most recent studies and systematic reviews find positive evidence while differing in their confidence and express the necessity of further study (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/39008110/, https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/37301799/, https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC11108950/).

Lastly the sole citation attached to the distinction as pseudoscience is a general purpose dictionary entry from 2007. It isn't really strong as support for current scientific consensus and predates most of the current literature. LogosCheck (talk) 16:09, 4 September 2026 (UTC)

The only thing i did with this article was replace some deprecated parameters? I didn't revert anything, and i don't know anything about this topic anyway. EmergentAnarchy (talk) 20:57, 4 September 2026 (UTC)

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00484-024-02649-x here's an open access review article from 2024 though if that helps EmergentAnarchy (talk) 21:03, 4 September 2026 (UTC)

@EmergentAnarchy: Jeez, tagged the wrong person! Sorry! Looks like I need to have my eyes checked! LogosCheck (talk) 00:36, 5 September 2026 (UTC)

@Roxy the dog: Sorry for the duplicate but I pinged the wrong editor originally. Can't think of a better place to put this. I saw you reversed my edit. How about we discuss and come to some sort of agreement. Here is my thinking when I made the change:

A few different issues

First off I do believe a skeptical tone is good and proper because the topic is currently an open question, and there is bogus science in marketing materials.

My issue is with the use of term pseudoscience without any qualifiers to describe a very heterogenous topic composed of all these different treatments for different ailments through different supposed pathways. It’s not like Flat Earth or thinking that vaccines cause autism where there’s a central doctrine that the whole ecosystem of claims hinges on. In many cases the only similarity between different things called “balneotherapy” is the presence of water.

There’s a logical/ definition issue because pseudoscience is being applied as if it means "probably bullshit" or even “doubted by mainstream science”. But even if all claims conceivably falling under the term were false, it is still being investigated in a legitimate scientific way. There have been numerous peer-reviewed studies including randomized trials that formulate falsifiable claims, use recognized scientific methods, assess bias, and explicitly acknowledge their limitations. This is discussion taking place within mainstream science. So the term pseudoscience is not exactly appropriate on the grounds of definition.

There’s also an epistemological problem. To reasonably claim knowledge that the field as a whole is pseudoscience requires an extremely high burden of proof. As previously mentioned many of its claims are almost unrelated to eachother. Case by case descriptions are more appropriate, but an unqualified classification of the entire category is really hard to justify. To truly claim “all of these things are pseudoscience” would take, well, knowing that all of those things are pseudoscience.

No recent scientists who have studied it go this far. It is acknowledged as controversial, postulated as because “biological mechanisms underlying these benefits have not yet been completely elucidated”( https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6032246/). Most recent studies and systematic reviews find positive evidence while differing in their confidence and express the necessity of further study (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/39008110/, https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/37301799/, https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC11108950/).

Lastly the sole citation attached to the distinction as pseudoscience is a general purpose dictionary entry from 2007. It isn't really strong as support for current scientific consensus and predates most of the current literature. LogosCheck (talk) 00:42, 5 September 2026 (UTC)

LogosCheck (talk) Sorry, I hadn't realised that you wanted me to respond to you. I'm not going to respond to your text here, but wanted to note that "pseudoscience" is exactly the right fit for this practice, and nothing you have said has changed that. - Walter Ego 11:35, 16 September 2026 (UTC)