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Mind & nervous system

Sleep3Burnout & exhaustion3Stress & anxiety3

Body & metabolism

Digestion & the gut3Weight & metabolic health3Back, neck & joints3Detox & the annual reset3

With a diagnosis

Chronic & rheumatic pain2After illness3Longevity & prevention3

Where you are

Menopause & perimenopause3Fertility & preconception1A first retreat3Travelling alone3Going together3

By problem and place

Ayurveda retreats in IndiaThe thermal kur retreats in AustriaThe thermal kur retreats in CzechiaThe thermal kur retreats in GermanyLongevity retreats in JapanLongevity retreats in SwitzerlandEvery list →
Start with the problem

15 concerns, each answered with what helps, what a fortnight can and cannot do, and where the evidence stops.

All concerns →

Asia

KeralaIndiaRishikeshIndiaThe Ayurveda coastSri LankaBhutanBhutanUbudIndonesiaKoh SamuiThailandBeppuJapanOkinawaJapan

Europe

Baden-BadenGermanyKarlovy VaryCzechiaBad GasteinAustriaQuiberonFranceMontreuxSwitzerlandTyrolAustria

The Americas & beyond

The Nicoya peninsulaCosta Rica

Booking from

United KingdomIrelandGermanyFranceSpainSwitzerlandEvery market →
The atlas

Every destination, the season each one is genuinely best in, and the months we would talk you out of.

Open the atlas →

The houses

Somatheeram Ayurveda VillageIndiaKalari KovilakomIndiaCarnoustie Ayurveda & Wellness ResortIndiaAnanda in the HimalayasIndiaSix Senses VanaIndia
Barberyn ReefSri LankaSantani Wellness ResortSri LankaAmankoraBhutanCOMO Shambhala EstateIndonesiaFivelements Retreat BaliIndonesia

By kind

Medical clinicsAyurveda hospitalsThermal curesRetreats
All 23 houses

The properties the world has actually heard of — and which of them we can book for you.

See them all →

Switzerland

Longevity

Two very different answers to the same question

The Blue Zone field studies from 2004, and the Swiss clinical tradition from 1931.

Regulated. Split down the middle. The clinical end — Swiss longevity medicine — is delivered by licensed physicians in registered clinics and is as regulated as any private hospital. The Blue Zone end is not a treatment at all; it is a place where people happen to live a very long time, and going there buys you the habits, not a procedure.

Minimum
5 nights
Recommended
10 nights
Destinations
3
Houses
3
A figure sitting alone above a mountain lake

What happens

A day, in practice

At the clinical end: two to seven days of imaging, bloods, cardiopulmonary testing and consultations, ending with a written protocol. At the Blue Zone end: no clinic at all — you stay with a family, walk the hills they walk, eat what they eat, and go home with a habit rather than a report.

Genuinely useful for

  • A full diagnostic baseline you will actually act on
  • Metabolic health — insulin resistance, visceral fat, lipids
  • Learning the daily habits that correlate with long life, in a place that still has them
  • Cardiovascular risk assessment beyond a standard annual check
  • Sleep, movement and diet rebuilt as a routine rather than a resolution

Ask a doctor first

  • The claims made for supplements and infusions at this end of the market run far ahead of the evidence — we say so on every page
  • A diagnostic week can surface incidental findings; you need a doctor at home to take them to
  • Nothing here treats an existing serious condition
  • The Swiss clinics are extremely expensive, and a great deal of what they sell is available at home
What this does not do. Nothing on this page is a diagnosis, and no discipline we sell cures a serious disease. Where the evidence is thin — and for several of these it is — we say so on the destination page rather than in a footnote.

What it actually is

The long version

Longevity medicine is the fastest-growing and least regulated category in this market, and the gap between its serious and ridiculous ends is wider than anywhere else on this site. At the serious end it is preventive medicine with a hotel attached: several days of genuine diagnostics — bloods, imaging, body composition, cardiovascular and metabolic assessment — read by physicians, followed by a programme built on the results and a protocol for the years after.

At the other end it is an infusion, a cryotherapy chamber and a supplement stack, sold on the strength of the word itself. There is one test that separates them and it is easy to apply: does the programme measure you before it prescribes, and does it measure you again at the end? If not, it is a spa with a laboratory-coloured brochure.

The honest position on the whole category is that the interventions with the best evidence are the least glamorous — sleep, resistance training and preserved muscle mass, not drinking, blood pressure, and social connection — and that almost nothing sold in a bottle at the end of a longevity programme has outcome evidence behind it. A good clinic will tell you this itself. Several do.

1931Clinique La Prairie founded
2–4 daysDiagnostics before prescribing
0Countries regulating the term
2Measurements — start and end

Checkable

  • Clinique La Prairie at Montreux has operated as a clinic since 1931 and is the origin of the modern residential longevity category.
  • The Blue Zone concept was coined by Gianni Pes and Michel Poulain for a region of Sardinia; Dan Buettner subsequently popularised it and added Okinawa, Nicoya, Ikaria and Loma Linda.
  • The Nicoya peninsula in Costa Rica and Okinawa in Japan are both long-studied longevity populations with distinctive traditional diets.
  • "Longevity clinic" is not a regulated designation anywhere; the underlying medical practice is regulated by the ordinary medical authorities of the country.
  • Biological-age tests based on DNA methylation exist commercially and are not standardised between providers.

Graded, claim by claim

Where the evidence stops

Every claim this discipline makes, graded — including the ones that do not survive. A page where all of these came back green would be a page nobody had checked.

  • Resistance training and preserved muscle mass predict healthy ageingWell supported

    Among the strongest findings in the whole field. Grip strength and muscle mass are robust predictors of mortality and functional independence, and the intervention is free.

  • Sleep, blood pressure and alcohol reduction change long-term outcomesWell supported

    Boring, enormous, and where nearly all the real effect sits. Any longevity programme that does not spend most of its consultation time here is selling something else.

  • Comprehensive screening in well people improves outcomesMixed evidence

    Genuinely contested. General health checks have not consistently reduced mortality in trials, and screening produces incidental findings, false positives and downstream investigations with their own risks. Ask what happens to an abnormal result and who follows it up.

  • Biological-age tests measure something meaningfulMixed evidence

    Epigenetic clocks correlate with outcomes at population level. Individual results are noisy, differ substantially between providers, and change with test batch. Interesting; not a personal dashboard.

  • Cell therapies and "revitalisation" injections extend life or healthNo support — we say so

    The historic signature of this category and unsupported by controlled outcome evidence. We do not sell them and we do not recommend them, at any property.

  • IV vitamin drips, cryotherapy and ozone deliver longevity benefitsNo support — we say so

    No outcome evidence. Some carry real risks. Their prominence on a clinic’s menu is a reasonable proxy for how seriously to take the rest of it.

  • Blue Zone diets and habits are associated with exceptional longevityMixed evidence

    The populations are real and long-studied, and the demographic methodology has been seriously challenged over record-keeping and age validation. The dietary and social patterns remain worth understanding; the mythology around them should be discounted.

An editorial summary written for travellers, not a systematic review, and the field moves. Where we were unsure between two grades we took the lower one.

What you will be given

The treatments, described honestly

  • Diagnostic work-up2–4 days

    Bloods across metabolic, hormonal, inflammatory and cardiovascular panels; imaging; body composition; cardiopulmonary testing. Nothing is prescribed until it is read, which is the entire distinction between this and a spa.

  • Physician consultationsSeveral, through the stay

    Internal medicine plus specialities as the findings direct — cardiology, endocrinology, nutrition. You should leave with numbers explained, not numbers emailed.

  • Nutrition assessment and kitchen workOngoing

    Dietary protocol from the results, usually with practical cooking sessions. The part guests actually use at home.

  • Movement and strength programmingDaily

    Prescribed rather than offered, and increasingly resistance-weighted rather than cardio-weighted — which reflects where the evidence went in the last decade.

  • Sleep assessmentAcross the stay

    Tracked and addressed as a clinical target rather than a comfort. The highest-yield intervention in most programmes.

  • Departure protocol and follow-upClosing consultation

    A written plan for the year and a repeat-testing schedule. A programme without this has sold you a week rather than a change.

Tell them apart

Not the same as a medical spa

A medical spa has a doctor on the premises. A longevity clinic builds the programme out of your diagnostics and measures again at the end. The test is chronology: if treatments were bookable before anything was measured, you are at the former. Both may be excellent; only one can tell you whether it worked.

Where it is practised well

3 houses

Destinations

3 places

The vocabulary

Words you will meet, defined once

Healthspan
Years lived in good function, as distinct from lifespan. The honest target.
Biological age
An estimate from biomarkers, often epigenetic. Noisy at the individual level.
Sarcopenia
Age-related loss of muscle mass and strength — the thing strength training is defending against.
VO₂ max
Maximal oxygen uptake; among the better-evidenced fitness predictors of mortality.
Blue Zone
A population with unusually high longevity. Coined for Sardinia; the methodology is contested.
Epigenetic clock
A DNA-methylation model estimating biological age.
Incidentaloma
A finding turned up by screening that was never causing trouble — and the main hazard of screening well people.

Questions

The ones we are actually asked

Is it worth the money?
If you want a full diagnostic work-up read by physicians in one week rather than over a year of appointments, and a protocol you will actually follow, then it can be. If you want the infusions, it is not. We will tell you which parts of a programme we think are load-bearing before you book.
What is the cheap version?
A Mayr cure with laboratory work at both ends gives you much of the metabolic and digestive half at a fraction of the price. And going to look at how people actually eat and move in Okinawa or Nicoya is a cheaper and more durable education than most protocols — we will book that too.
Should I worry about over-screening?
You should think about it. Extensive screening in well people is not an unqualified good: it finds things that were never going to trouble you and sets off investigations that carry their own risk. Ask the clinic what its policy is on incidental findings and who follows them up.
What about the supplements at the end?
Ask what the outcome evidence is, specifically, for each one. A good clinic will distinguish between correcting a measured deficiency — which is medicine — and a proprietary stack, which is retail. Both may be on the same invoice.