Updated 13/09/2026
Photo: Bathhouse in Tskaltubo Mineral Water Park, by Alexey Komarov (Wikimedia), cropped for layout · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0 · Source
Plain-language summary of research published in the Georgian Medical Journal. Written for the general public by the GMJ News editorial team.
Georgia’s Tskaltubo spa waters have treated joint disease for a century — long before anyone could explain, in physiological terms, why bathers said they felt better. A prospective clinical study in the Georgian Medical Journal now supplies measured answers, examining how a standardised course of low-radon nitrogen mineral baths affects red blood cell properties and microcirculation in 165 patients with osteoarthritis (OA).
Why Osteoarthritis Is More Than “Wear and Tear”
Osteoarthritis is a leading cause of disability worldwide, and the paper’s background section is careful to frame it as more than mechanical wear on a joint. It is increasingly understood as a multifactorial disease, involving inflammatory, metabolic, biomechanical, and microvascular mechanisms acting together. Emerging evidence specifically implicates hemorheological disturbances — problems with how red blood cells flow and behave, including impaired membrane stability and increased clumping — as contributors to tissue hypoxia and disease progression.
The Study Design
This prospective observational study covered 165 patients with radiographically confirmed osteoarthritis (Kellgren–Lawrence stage I–IV, mean age 58.4 ± 6.7), who underwent 22–25 flow-through isothermal mineral baths (20 minutes each, 34–35°C). Blood parameters — red cell count, haemoglobin, ultrasonic resistance time, electrokinetic potential, and aggregation activity — were measured before and after, benchmarked against ten age-matched healthy controls.
Where OA Patients Started, Compared With Healthy Controls
Before treatment, the osteoarthritis patients’ blood already looked measurably different from healthy controls: reduced ultrasonic resistance (mean difference −2.4 min, p=0.021), decreased electrokinetic potential (mean difference −3.1 mV, p=0.008), and increased aggregation activity (mean difference +5.4%, p=0.012) — a pattern fully consistent with the hemorheological disturbance the background describes.
At a glance — the headline figures.
An integrated mechanistic model connecting Tskaltubo mineral bath exposure through molecular activation, improved erythrocyte properties, enhanced microcirculation, and cartilage oxygenation, to measurable clinical improvement. Figure from the study. Source: Georgian Medical Journal, Vol. 1 No. 1 (2026), DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.19076785.
After the treatment course, electrokinetic potential increased by 18.4% (p=0.006), ultrasonic resistance time by 14.7% (p=0.011), and aggregation activity fell by 16.2% (p=0.004) — all three parameters moving in the favourable direction. Improvements were more pronounced in patients with synovitis, and the change in electrokinetic potential correlated with pain reduction (r=0.42, p=0.018) — a measured physiological change tracking with how patients actually felt.
The authors are careful about the limits of an observational, single-arm design: it demonstrates association, not proof that the baths alone caused every change, and they explicitly call for randomised controlled trials with molecular biomarkers and longer follow-up. Still, for a national therapeutic resource that has run on tradition for a century, this is a concrete, quantitative step toward the evidence-based footing Georgian spa medicine has long lacked.
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Read the Original Research
Original article: What Tskaltubo’s Waters Do to Blood: Measuring the Effects of Radon Mineral Baths
Published in: Georgian Medical Journal, Vol. 1 No. 1 (2026)
DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.19076785
📄 Read the full article at gmj.ge →
Georgian Medical Journal (GMJ) · ISSN 3088-4322 · gmj.ge · Open Access CC BY 4.0 · Published by the Public Health Institute of Georgia (PHIG). This summary is an independent editorial product of GMJ News; for clinical decisions, consult the original peer-reviewed article and a qualified professional.
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