Internet of Things in SPA Medicine: A General Framework to Improve User Treatments

Spa treatments may mistakenly be considered palliative compared to traditional medicines; however, this is not the case. Mineral/thermal waters are medicines for all intents and purposes and should be analyzed and used as such. The difference in spa treatments compared to other medicines is the greater complexity with which they are delivered. Patients must follow a course of treatment that can last up to a couple of weeks, during which the effects of the therapy gradually go into evidence. Both inside and outside the spa facility, having patient monitoring could be a valuable tool to measure the effectiveness of treatment and possibly even intervene with personalized care based on the parameters detected. New technologies and paradigms such as the Internet of Things can offer a valuable tool to improve spa care through active monitoring of patients, both inside and outside the facilities, by going to measure what are the key parameters (i.e., heart rate, blood oxygenation, etc.) to track the progress of the therapy accurately and precisely during treatment. In particular, wearable devices (smartwatches or smart bands) can perform constant and non-invasive monitoring of the patient's status and the therapy itself. Therefore, the work aims to define a framework based on the Internet of Things paradigm for intelligent analysis of spa treatments to manage patients correctly.