"SPELEOTHERAPY
This underground facility is situated within the Solotvyno salt mine
near a small Ukrainian villageof the same name, close to the Romanian border.
It was opened during Soviet times in the 1970s,
and operates alongside the Ukrainian State Allergy Hospital which is also located nearby.
The therapy which takes place at Solotvyno is based on a method
known as Speleo- therapy, an alternative therapy for asthma and other respiratory diseases.
This therapy was discovered in Poland in the 1950s when it was noticed that salt mine
workers rarely suffered from tuberculosis. Scientists found that the salt-permeated
air of the working salt mine helped to dissolve phlegm in the bronchial tubes and
also killed the micro-organisms which caused infections – and that this greatly
helped patients who were undertaking treatment for asthma.
