SHA Wellness Clinic and Lanserhof Sylt come up together in almost every conversation we have about a serious health stay in Europe. Both are excellent, and we book both. They rest on two different medicines, and that is what decides which one suits you.
This compares SHA Spain, above the Mediterranean near Alicante, with Lanserhof Sylt, on Germany's northernmost island. SHA also operates in Mexico, and we cover that choice separately. Lanserhof also operates in Lans and Tegernsee, and we compare the three locations here.
Which one, quickly
SHA practises integrative medicine. Western diagnostics, Traditional Chinese Medicine, anti-inflammatory nutrition and regenerative therapies are run by separate departments that share one view of you. You come home with habits you can keep.
Lanserhof Sylt practises the Lanserhof Method, derived from F.X. Mayr medicine and modernised. Everything starts by letting the gut rest, under a doctor who adjusts your protocol daily. You come home reset.
A week at SHA starts at €8,925 and a week at Lanserhof Sylt starts at €6,480, in both cases with the entry room, the program and full board. Choose SHA for breadth and for food you look forward to. Choose Lanserhof for depth on the gut, and for the discipline that comes with it.
Two medicines
SHA and integrative medicine
SHA is owned and run by the Bataller family. Alfredo Bataller found integrative health after thirty years of digestive problems, and the clinic grew out of that recovery. His son Alejandro runs it with him.
The method looks at every dimension of health at once. It combines functional and preventive medicine, regenerative therapies, gut health and anti-inflammatory nutrition. Each department holds its own speciality and the experts compare notes on you.
Dr Vicente Mera leads on anti-aging medicine and hormonal supplementation. Dr Philippa Harvey directs Traditional Chinese Medicine. She holds a doctorate in TCM and an MSc in applied psychology, so she works the clinical and the behavioural side at once. Cognitive development and brain stimulation sit with Dr Bruno Ribeiro, and aesthetic medicine with Dr Barbara Dalbos. The team also includes psychologists, which is rare at this level, and our clients almost always end up valuing those sessions.
Lanserhof Sylt and Mayr medicine
Lanserhof started in Lans, Austria, in 1984, on the principles of F.X. Mayr. The Lanserhof Method keeps the Mayr foundation and adds current preventive medicine, advanced diagnostics and natural healing.
Sylt is the newest of the group and the most international. It carries the deepest Mayr diagnostics of any Lanserhof, and it is the location for the sleep programs and the newest cardiac screening. Longevity and biohacking are taken seriously here.
Dr Jan Stritzke has led the medical department at Sylt since 2020. He is a cardiologist, and he arrived from the Asklepios Nordseeklinik in Westerland, where he was head physician of cardiology. The strength of the cardiac work on the island follows from that.
Your doctor sees you throughout, and the program you arrive with is the program you leave with only if your body agrees. That daily adjustment is the method working.
What you actually eat
The food is where guests feel the difference first, and where most articles get Lanserhof wrong.
At SHA, three menus run in parallel. The SHA menu gives you a starter, a main and a dessert in sensible quantities, so you enjoy the meal without loading your digestion. Biolight is lighter and pushes detox harder without feeling like a fast. Kushi is the lightest option, and the one to pick for weight loss.
Around them sits a set of therapeutic drinks. Miso soup at breakfast, a glass of vinegar before lunch and dinner, apple Zulu tea to close a meal. A snack arrives around four, which matters because dinner at SHA is late, especially in summer.
At Lanserhof, you do not follow a fixed diet and nobody counts your calories at you. You agree a food protocol with your doctor and it is adjusted daily, according to how your gut is responding. Some guests fast. Others eat for energy while still resting the digestive system. And plenty eat food that does not feel like a clinic at all, desserts included.
What is constant at Lanserhof is the chewing. It is slower than you expect, and it is the part guests underestimate. Most stop thinking about food after three or four days and start noticing the effect instead. And you spend time in the toilets.
What it costs
Both clinics price a program on top of a room, so your total moves with the program you need and where you sleep. Each figure below carries the stay length it applies to, because the shortest booking is not the same at every program. They come from our rate engine and change when the clinics change them.
At SHA, the entry point is Rebalance & Energize at From €5,100 for 4 nights. Detox & Optimal Weight is From €9,100 for 7 nights, and its intensive version From €10,675 for 7 nights. Advanced Longevity, which is what most of our clients go to SHA for, is From €12,950 for 7 nights. Leader's Health and Performance is From €6,200 for 4 nights.
At Lanserhof Sylt, Lanserhof Classic is From €6,480 for 7 nights and Classic Plus is From €7,546 for 7 nights. The Longevity Check is From €4,844 for 4 nights. Programs built around one objective sit higher: Stress Resilience is From €11,064 for 7 nights, Women's Health is From €12,910 for 7 nights and Men's Health is From €13,727 for 7 nights.
Read those on the same basis before you draw a conclusion. Take the cheapest seven-night week at each: SHA is from €8,925 and Lanserhof Sylt is from €6,480. People assume the German clinic is the expensive one.
One thing to plan for at Lanserhof: very few guests stay on Classic alone. After the first consultation, most add the treatments their doctor recommends, and the final invoice reflects that. We can give you a realistic figure before you book.
The programs
SHA takes guests from four nights and most stay seven. Rebalance & Energize and Leader's Health and Performance both start at four nights. Detox & Optimal Weight, its intensive version, and Advanced Longevity all start at seven, and Advanced Longevity is better at fourteen. Stay Your Way and Tailor-Made exist for guests who have been before and know what they want.
Lanserhof Sylt also takes guests from four nights, and five to seven is typical. Lanserhof Classic and Classic Plus run from seven. The Longevity Check and Sport & Meditation are four-night formats. Then come the focused programs: Stress Resilience, Boost Your Performance, Women’s Health, Men’s Health, Sleep Well, Sleep Apnoea, Long COVID, Breast Cancer Rehab, Ortho Spine and Ortho Post Op. The orthopaedic and rehabilitation programs start at nine nights.
If this is a first Mayr stay and your diary allows it, take ten nights rather than seven. The last days are where the eating gets rebuilt on purpose, and that is the part that travels home with you.
Which one for what brought you
If something is wrong
Go to SHA when several things are wrong at once, and they are connected. Thyroid trouble feeding fatigue, feeding poor sleep, feeding weight gain. Separate departments can work the same guest at the same time, and the psychologists matter here. Burnout and hormonal imbalance are two of the strongest cases for SHA.
Go to Lanserhof Sylt when the gut is the problem, or when you suspect it is upstream of everything else. Daily abdominal work, intestinal rehabilitation and a doctor reading your progress every morning will move a digestive condition faster than a broader approach. Sylt is also where to go for cardiac screening and for sleep.
If you are already well
SHA suits guests who want to keep learning. Advanced Longevity runs deep on cellular aging, cognitive work and hormonal optimisation, and it is the reason many of our clients come back yearly. SHA also handles a two-week stay better than most clinics. We can put your treatments and consultations in the morning so you work from your suite in the afternoon, which is how a lot of our clients manage a long stay.
Lanserhof suits guests who respond to structure. The four-night Longevity Check is efficient if that is genuinely all the time you have, though four nights is too short to detox properly or to change how you eat. Boost Your Performance is the format for executives who are functioning well and want more.
The two settings
SHA sits at L'Albir near Alicante, in a quiet residential area beside a natural park, with the sea below and mountains behind. The sun is out around three hundred days per year. The building is open and full of plants, and the lighthouse walk is the one group activity nobody skips. Altea, a few minutes away, is worth an afternoon.
One honest note. On a winter day SHA can feel cool, because you walk outside between some rooms and the restaurant or the medical area. It is not a problem in most seasons.
Until recently the entry-level rooms at SHA divided opinion, and some clients found them dated. That is settled. As of 2026 every entry-level room has been rebuilt, and the new design is very good. The higher suites were always spacious, indoors and out.
Lanserhof Sylt stands between the dunes and the Wadden Sea, a UNESCO site, at the northern tip of the island. The building cost 120 million euros and it shows, in the round forms, the thatched roof and the way the space holds together. There are only 55 rooms and suites, and 5,000 square metres given to medicine and treatment. That ratio tells you what the place is for.
Sylt is not the easiest address to reach, and it is easier in summer. You fly to Hamburg and take the train across the causeway, or fly to the island directly. The trip is part of the reset. Alicante airport, by comparison, is about forty-five minutes from SHA.
Choose SHA if you
- Have several health issues that feed each other
- Want Eastern medicine working alongside Western diagnostics
- Would struggle with real dietary restriction
- Are recovering from burnout and want a warm setting
- Want to keep working part of the day during a long stay
- Are energised by sun and a Mediterranean pace
Choose Lanserhof Sylt if you
- Came for the gut, or suspect the gut is behind the rest
- Want a doctor reading your progress every morning
- Need cardiac screening or help with sleep
- Do better with clear rules than with choice
- Want a full reset instead of a set of habits
- Are drawn to cool light, dunes and open sea
When you still cannot decide
If you have read this far and the food at Lanserhof is the part you keep worrying about, go to SHA. You will heal better somewhere you are not fighting your own appetite.
If you have read this far and the discipline of the Mayr cure sounds like a relief, go to Lanserhof. The structure is the treatment.
And if you are still torn, tell us what you are dealing with, what you have already tried and when you can travel. We have sent a lot of clients to both, and we will tell you which one we would book for you. You pay the same rate as going direct. The clinic pays us a commission after your stay, which is how we keep the advice independent and this service free.