Three minutes at minus 85, for the recovery you keep losing
You lose training days to soreness, your mood runs flatter than it should, or you want relief alongside treatment for joint pain. Whole-body cryotherapy in Limassol is sold for all of it. At AION you get the version with screening first, a supervisor at the glass the whole time, and an honest account of what the evidence supports before you ever step into the cold.
Electric chamber, no liquid nitrogen
Minus 85 degrees Celsius
Sessions up to 3 minutes
What the research honestly shows
Cryotherapy is marketed harder than it is studied, so here is the actual state of the evidence:
- For post-exercise soreness, its most famous use, a Cochrane review found the evidence insufficient to say whether it works. AION says that plainly rather than quietly
- As an add-on for depression, a sham-controlled trial of 92 patients found significant mood improvement after 10 sessions (Rymaszewska 2020)
- As an adjunct in rheumatoid arthritis, a randomized trial found less pain and lower disease activity, with over half the treatment group cutting back painkillers (Klemm 2022)
- These are small, single trials: promising signals for the right person, never a replacement for standard treatment, and never a claim
Who may be suitable
Cryotherapy is one of the lighter therapies at AION, but cold stress is still stress, so screening comes first. It usually sits within the recovery side of a plan, alongside training load or sleep and stress findings.
It may be considered when
- Your health screening is complete
- It fits the recovery side of your plan
- You are comfortable with short, intense cold
Screening looks closely at
- Heart and circulation conditions
- Cold sensitivity and related conditions
- Pregnancy and recent illness
What a session involves
The whole visit takes minutes, and you are never sealed in or out of sight.
Before
A short screening review, then you change into the protective wear provided: gloves, socks and footwear protection.
During
You step into the chamber and move freely for up to three minutes. The supervisor watches you through the glass door the whole time, and you can step out whenever you want.
After
You warm up naturally within minutes. Most people go straight back to their day.
Risks and side effects
A trained operator watches every session through the glass door, and screening for contraindications happens before your first session, not after. Cryotherapy is brief by design, and the known side effects are:
- Skin redness and tingling after the session
- Numbness in fingers and toes, which the protective wear is there to prevent
- Rarely, cold burns when protocols are not followed, which is why sessions are supervised and time-limited
- AION does not present cryotherapy as a treatment for any condition
Related clinical evidence
View the full clinical evidence library →The evidence behind Cryotherapy
Whole Body Cryotherapy: Procedure, Safety Profile, and Contraindications
Whole Body Cryotherapy for Athletic Recovery and Muscle Soreness (DOMS)
Whole Body Cryotherapy as an Adjunct for Depressive Symptoms
Whole Body Cryotherapy for Weight Loss, Fat Reduction, and Metabolic Markers
Whole Body Cryotherapy and Immune/Inflammatory Modulation
Questions about Cryotherapy
Usually skin redness and tingling that pass quickly. The protective gloves, socks and time limit exist to prevent anything more serious, and a supervisor watches every session.
People with certain heart and circulation conditions, cold-sensitivity disorders, or during pregnancy. The pre-session screening covers this, and your answers stay part of your clinic record.
The clinic provides gloves, socks and footwear protection. You keep your underwear or sportswear on, and everything cold-sensitive is covered.
Minus 85 degrees Celsius. It sounds extreme, and it is, but the exposure is dry air for a maximum of three minutes, with the door in sight and a supervisor watching. It is an electric chamber, no liquid nitrogen involved.
No. Dermatological cryosurgery is a targeted freeze of one spot of skin. Whole-body cryotherapy is a brief cold-air exposure for your whole body. They share a name, not a purpose.
Honestly mixed. The famous sports-recovery claim is unproven: a Cochrane review found the evidence insufficient either way. The more interesting results are small randomized trials showing benefit as an add-on for low mood and for inflammatory joint pain, alongside standard treatment. AION screens first, frames it as supportive, and makes no treatment claims.
Connected care
One body. Everything connects.
What you've just read is rarely the whole story. These are often part of the same picture.
Treatment
Shockwave Therapy
Focused sound-wave pulses for stubborn tendon pain: heel, calcific shoulder, outer hip and tennis elbow, within a physiotherapy plan.
Treatment
Rehabilitation & Physiotherapy
Sports, orthopaedic and neurological rehabilitation, built from a physiotherapy assessment, not a generic program.
Program
Performance AION 360
Sports performance testing in Limassol, for people whose real question is not what is wrong, but what would make them perform better.
Find out if Cryotherapy is your answer.
One free call. You leave knowing whether AION fits your case, what it would involve, and what it costs. If the honest answer is no, you hear that too, and it costs you nothing to hear it.
Your free call is with Dr Inbar Almon Tofan, AION Department Manager, and Sylvia, Patient Coordinator. It is a first conversation, not a medical consultation.