Traditional European Medicine (TEM) is a synonym for the concept of diagnosis and treatment dating back to Hippocrates of Kos (c. 460 – c. 370 BC), a Greek physician commonly referred to as the “Father of Medicine”, and predominant in the Western hemisphere including the US well into the 19th century.
One of the foundations of TEM is the therapeutic use of the physical properties of water as well as particular compounds, extensively described already in the so called Hippocratic Corpus (Latin: Corpus Hippocraticum), and developed and taught at medical schools, and practiced until today in many European countries. Derived from the classic Greek word for bath, βαλανεῖον (balaneion), latin balneum , the science and art of using water for therapeutic purposes is called balneology.
Medicine has made unbelievable progress over the last 150 years or so, mainly because of an ever increasing understanding of the pathology of many health problems, an essential precondition to treat the very cause, not just the symptoms. For many health problems a golden standard could be established, as for instances the development and use of antibiotics for severe bacterial infections.
There is, however, a spectrum of health disturbancies where a clear cause and effect relationship cannot not be established. Modern medicine has coined several terms for respective problems, one of the most used is “MUS” (medically unexplained symptoms), defined as “persistent bodily complaints, including pain and discomfort” []. Synonyms include, among others, the terms “Persistent Physical Symptoms”, and “Functional Symptoms” or “Functional Syndromes” []. The latter describes the inherent problem that no obvious structural abnormalities whatsoever can be diagnosed leaving those affected with the assumption that “somethings going wrong”. “Chronic Fatigue” is often associated, yet in remains unclear whether it is more likely the cause of the problem or a consequence of it.
It is a physiological fact that bodily and/or mental distress (as regularly associated with MUS) itself is associated with an activation of the sympathetic nervous system (SNS []), often referred to as the “fight or flight” system, which activates and supports those functions of the body that are key to survival and to react to (dangerous) external/environmental stimuli at the expense of its counterpart, the parasympathetic nervous system (PNS). Activation of the latter, also known as the “rest and digest” system, gives priority to those functions of the body that foster nutrition and cleansing of organs and tissues, and regeneration and growth.
Any imbalance in favor of the SNS is inherently associated with impaired nutrition, metabolism and excretion, and thus with proper functioning of the body (and mind). In the premodern ear of medicine these interrelations were not understood, yet meticulous observation (then the most important scientific strategy) identified interventions that reliably modified subjective complaints and discomfort to the better. Balneotherapy, in particular whole body immersion into warm water, was among the most promising and powerful options, not least because neither particular skills or activities were required from the patients.
In the meantime basic research into the effects of whole body immersion has revealed that buoyancy (in fresh water) decreases the effects of gravity by about 90%, triggering proprioceptors (particular sensors constantly monitoring the muscle tome) to tell the muscles to considerably lower the degree of muscle tension resulting in a decrease of around 10% of the basal metabolic rate. Already a small decrease in muscle tone leads to a marked rise in tissue perfusion, with warm water additionally stimulating vasodilation of large vessels as well as capillaries.
Increased hydrostatic pressure which is most pronounced in the lower parts of the body, “squeezes” tissue fluid (lymph) back into the circulatory systems. Volume receptors in the body take note of the rise in blood volume and elicit compensatory mechanisms, such as urination, to return the volume to normal by reducing the amount of water in the blood thus promoting the effects of cleansing. Research has shown that repeated whole body (head out) immersion is associated with significant decline of many substances diluted in the blood including heavy metals etc.
Empiric evidence from hundreds of years of practicing as well as contemporary scientific evidence suggests that positive environmental factors (optic, acoustic, olphactory), absence of and protection from daily hassle and other “non-specific” stimuli (in pharmacologic terms, but well specific for a spa/healing environment []) contribute to a sustained recovery of the autonomic regulatory system of the body, and to a broad improvement of bodily and mental resilience.
Karl-Ludwig Resch, MD, PhD
References:
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- Barsky AJ, Borus JF. Functional somatic syndromes. Ann Intern Med. 1999 Jun 1;130(11):910-21. doi:10.7326/0003-4819-130-11-199906010-00016. PMID: 10375340.
- Wehrwein EA, Orer HS, Barman SM. Overview of the Anatomy, Physiology, and Pharmacology of the Autonomic Nervous System. Compr Physiol. 2016 Jun 13;6(3):1239-78. doi: 10.1002/cphy.c150037. PMID: 27347892.
- Frost GJ. The spa as a model of an optimal healing environment. J Altern Complement Med. 2004;10 Suppl 1:S85-92. doi: 10.1089/1075553042245908. PMID: 15630825.