Dean Skivington credits cold therapy with turning his life around.

And now, through his innovative CryoShower product, he’s hoping to do the same for millions across the world.

The 42-year-old suffered a back injury in 2007 while playing rugby.

But what should have been a routine operation for a ruptured disc did not go as planned.

It was followed by a second corrective operation and then the discovery that a serious infection had wrapped itself around his spinal column and nerves.

Surgeons managed to remove around 50 per cent of the infection and abscesses but it meant another lengthy stay in hospital followed by nine months of intravenous and tablet antibiotics.

Dean said: “A third operation to remove some of the abscesses meant that surgeons could no longer operate on my back without considerable risk of major lifelong damage.

“I was now in continual pain.

“I was hunched, crooked and disabled.

“And, to cap it all, I wasn’t able to work and so I lost my job.”

There followed more than a decade of medication as Dean found his life spiral into addictions and depression.

It included five years in Spain where he met his future wife, Ana.

His health breakthrough came in 2019.

He said: “I was listening to motivational stuff on YouTube and came across Wim Hof, the Dutch motivational speaker, talking about the benefits of cold showers and breathwork.

“I’d tried everything else so, perhaps, this was a way of getting away from medication after 12 years.

“I started a ten week programme with Wim Hof covering breathwork, cold therapy and yoga and it changed my life.

“Supported by Ana, I began a new path of self-development, mindfulness, healthy eating, deep breathing, cold therapy and exercise.

“But I became frustrated with the water temperatures in Spain during the summer months

“The temperature never drops below 16 degrees.

“My lightbulb moment came as I was in the shower.

“There and then I decided that I was going to create a product that cools the naturally cold temperature and it was going to be called CryoShower.”

The original vision was to build a patented electronic unit to lower the cold temperature of a shower or bath by ten to 12 degrees.

However, bringing it to market was set to be prohibitively expensive.

Instead a compact, portable unit which attaches to a shower or bath was developed.

ICE BLAST is capable of reducing the tap temperatures to deliver water in the cold therapy zone.

It can be used in the home or on the go.

Dean, who lives in Ashley Cross, Poole, incorporated CryoShower as a limited company in 2019.

The same year he registered the CryoShower brand and filed a patent.