You definitely have a predicament! Have you thought about calling a few hot tub companies? I am sure your are not the first person to have this type of chemical sensitivity and they might have an alternate solution.

All the local hot tub places I've tried (thinking maybe someone can come do a service call and tell me how to take care of it at the same time) only sell products that require chemical shocks. There seem to be a lot of natural hot tub options, just no live people to talk to about them that either aren't trying to sell me something that they can't back up or have actually used it.

The problem is there is no way to maintain clean hot tub water without a residual sanitizer level of some sort. There are many great systems out there that help you limit chlorine or bromine levels. I like ozone and mineral combined with a non-chlorine oxidizing shock called Potassium Monopersulphate (or O2 shock). Use that with a low level of bromine or chlorine to maintain a residual.

Shock with the MPS 10 minutes before you go in to oxidize chloromines or bromines (the bad used up chlorine and bromine particles ) and you will have a much more comfortable experience.

The odor and irritation associated with chlorine and bromine is actually from used up chlorine/bromine. That is what the MPS shock helps oxidize.

Ozone and UV oxidize or make contaminates inactive, however without a free residual of a halogen based sanitizer like chlorine or bromine there is no way to prevent peer to peer contaminate contact.

We are facing the same issue, my husband is allergic to bromine and chlorine, so we opted to try something completely different, we went with uv sanitization. We have just begun this trial. We purchased a complete system, added it to the filtration of our spa (we have a swim spa) we will use liquid chlorine periodically to stabilize the water when we are taking a few days off from use.

Yes we have done a couple UV and Ozone combo systems and have luck with that and small amounts of liquid chlorine.

You dont need a lot of chlorine residual in reaidential pools with low bather load. 1 to 2 ppm should be fine with the uv ozone combo systems.

Plus a lot of issues people have are from poor ph and alkalinity balance , wo make sure those are perdect at all times as that will drastically affect how well a low chlorine system works.

With an ozonator and a nature2 cartridge, we don't have to do much else to our spa. I use a non-chlorine shock from time to time. I've not noticed any residue after adding it and running the pumps (cover open) for 20 minutes. I never add bromine/chlorine.

As the poster above says, when I do the initial fill, I get the pH right (the water here is acid so I almost always have to add sodium carbonate... aka washing soda).

I figured I should post a follow up in case it can help others in a similar situation.

For a heavier bather load we might have considered a UV or ozone system, but seeing as we were new to owning a hot tub, we were hesitant to invest the money to upgrade the system (from what we could find, it would be at least several thousand dollars) when we had no idea how much use the hot tub would get.

It did take several months and a few flushes of water for the hot tub to stop smelling heavily of chlorine. We did a few weeks of letting it run with some soda in the water with no bathers, to try to remove the odor and replaced the filters completely. We decided to try Ahhnatural's system for the tub, and it has worked beautifully. I would probably consider the hot tub usage light, and we've enforced quick pre-showering with no problems (our guests were happy to use a hot tub in a pretty backyard, so no fuss about needing to pre-shower). That being said, the hot tub is a pleasure now. We've shocked regularly, and extra after holidays when the tub had extra use with guests. We've occasionally used an enzyme designed for hot tubs. We have no slime, no smell and clear water. No dry skin or rashes. We don't find we need to check on it often when it's not been used. In addition to my being able to use it safely, my family members don't smell of chlorine to make me ill. While I'm sure those who would not like to pre-shower or those with small children that might pee the tub may need chemical treatment, for those who are sensitive to normal hot tub treatments the Ahhnatural system has worked well for us. I paid full price for their system, this isn't a paid endorsement and I've not spoken to them since I did my online order, so aside from my favoritism for non-chemical systems, I feel this is a fairly unbiased review. Hopefully it will help someone else.

So happy to see this discussion. The reason why I created ahhNatural was, I also have chemical sensitivities and prefer natural, organic lifestyle products. There was nothing out there 15 years ago so It became my one women mission to figure something out. Here's a link to my website that has lots of reviews and you can always ask questions, I'm here to help. Lots of families use it along with enzymes to deal with pee - the system also is great for vacation rentals and health practitioners love it!

To read more and see a few reviews in one place Click HERE

more reviews? Click on the review tab at the bottom of the product page

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// Marina Teramond @ N.M.P.L.