Dermatological potential of thermo-mineral waters from Beira Interior Region, Portugal

Hydrothermal features in Portugal have been used since ancient times for therapeutic purposes that are mainly distributed in north and central region, being Beira Interior, located in central region, is characterized by eight spas. As for Portuguese thermo-mineral waters there are scarce studies about the characterization of its relation with the beneficial effects on human health. In last decade there is a renewing interest about thermalism and innovation, mainly on the evidence practice based in this area. One of the most important factors that support the therapeutic effect of mineral medicinal waters is the physico-chemical composition. A physico-chemical categorization of these eight thermal waters was carried out in order to undertake an statistical analysis of the correlation of the physico-chemical classification and its therapeutic indication. According to this, data from these eight thermal waters were collected and submitted to Principal Component Analysis (PCA) and partial lest squared (PLS) that clustered the selected thermal waters in 4 groups, regarding to their chemical composition, and correlated with the therapeutic indication.