Longevity has become one of the biggest talking points in health and wellness. But once you move past supplements, wearable trackers and the latest anti-ageing trend, there is a much more serious side to it: medical longevity.

Across Europe, a growing number of medical resorts and specialist clinics are offering programmes built around diagnostics, nutrition, prevention, movement and healthy ageing. Some focus heavily on technology. Others have their roots in digestive health or preventive medicine.

So, if you were actually thinking about travelling somewhere in Europe for a medically guided longevity stay, where could you go?

We looked at eight established providers and the approaches they currently offer.

Longevity Medicine in Europe: In Brief

• Longevity medicine focuses on healthspan, not just lifespan — the aim is to support long-term health, independence, energy and quality of life.
• European providers differ significantly in their approach, ranging from diagnostics-heavy clinics to Mayr-based medical resorts and broader medical-wellness concepts.
• Original Mayr Medical Resort combines diagnostics, prevention and gut health with almost 50 years of experience in Mayr Medicine and a private setting on Lake Wörthersee.
• The number of tests matters less than how results are interpreted and translated into relevant medical, nutritional and lifestyle recommendations.
• A good longevity stay should provide clarity for life after the stay, rather than simply offering short-term treatments or a large diagnostic report.

First of all, what does “longevity medicine” actually mean?

The word longevity simply refers to living for a long time. But when it is used in medicine, the conversation increasingly focuses on healthspan rather than lifespan alone.

In other words, the goal isn't simply adding years to life. It is trying to maintain health, mobility, mental function, independence and quality of life for as long as possible.

That helps explain why modern longevity programmes tend to cover much more than one treatment or test.

Depending on the provider, a stay might involve blood tests, metabolic assessments, cardiovascular screening, body-composition analysis, nutrition, exercise, sleep or stress management. The medical team then uses those findings to build recommendations around the individual.

There is an important distinction here: no short resort stay can tell you exactly how long you will live. And a single biomarker moving in the right direction should not be treated as proof that your lifespan has increased.

The more realistic value of this type of medicine is in understanding your present health more clearly and using that information to make better decisions for the future.

©Original Mayr Medical Resort

1. Original Mayr Medical Resort – Lake Wörthersee, Austria

One of the more interesting providers in this space is Original Mayr Medical Resort, particularly if you're interested in the relationship between digestion, nutrition and long-term health.

The resort is located in Dellach on Lake Wörthersee and opened in 1976. Its medical history is closely connected to Mayr Medicine: its first medical director, Dr Erich Rauch, was a student of Dr Franz Xaver Mayr.

That heritage matters because the current concept hasn't simply added “longevity” to an existing spa offering. Its approach has developed from a medical philosophy that has long placed the digestive system at the centre of health.

For guests interested in gut health, detox, diagnostics and prevention, Original Mayr’s programmes are built around a combination of medical care, diagnostic insight, Mayr Cuisine and therapeutic treatments.

While individual programme names, durations and inclusions may change over time, the underlying structure remains focused on understanding the body, supporting digestive health and translating medical findings into practical lifestyle recommendations.

What does the diagnostics approach involve?

The diagnostics and prevention offering is one of the clearest examples of how Original Mayr approaches longevity.

Rather than treating longevity as an abstract wellness concept, the approach begins with a medical understanding of the individual. Depending on the guest’s needs and selected programme, this may include an initial medical examination, check-ups, laboratory analysis and further diagnostic or preventive screening where appropriate.

The important part is what happens next.

Testing is not presented simply as a collection of health data. Instead, the findings are intended to inform the wider medical and prevention plan, helping shape recommendations around nutrition, treatments and everyday lifestyle habits.

That makes the idea of longevity here quite practical: first understand what is happening in the body, then decide what may actually be worth changing.

Why the focus on gut health?

This is probably the clearest difference between Original Mayr and many broader longevity clinics.

Digestive health is not treated as a side topic. It sits at the centre of the Mayr approach alongside nutrition, metabolism, movement and recovery.

That doesn't mean the gut can explain every health issue. But it does give the resort a more defined starting point than providers offering a very broad menu of unrelated longevity treatments.

And for anyone slightly sceptical of the current longevity hype, the resort's history is another interesting point. Longevity may be a fashionable term now, but Original Mayr has been working with medically guided prevention and digestive health for decades.

©Original Mayr Medical Resort

2. Lanserhof – Austria and Germany

Lanserhof is probably one of the most recognisable names in European medical wellness.

Its Longevity Programme uses diagnostics based around the “Hallmarks of Aging” and looks at genetic, cellular and metabolic factors when building an individual treatment plan. Depending on the location and programme, this may include laboratory testing, microbiome analysis, metabolic measurements, heart-rate-variability testing and exercise assessment. 

Lanserhof currently operates European resorts including Lans in Austria and Tegernsee and Sylt in Germany. 

3. Clinique La Prairie – Montreux, Switzerland

Clinique La Prairie has been operating in Montreux since 1931 and is probably one of Europe's best-known names in premium longevity medicine.

Its seven-day Revitalisation programme combines medical assessment with its proprietary CLP Extract treatment, nutrition, movement and wellbeing elements. The Montreux site also has more than 50 doctors on-site across its wider medical offering. 

This is very much at the high end of the market: the published price for the standard seven-day Revitalisation programme currently starts at CHF 31,800 including accommodation. 

4. VIVAMAYR – Maria Wörth, Austria

VIVAMAYR is another major Austrian name associated with modern Mayr Medicine.

Its current health concept starts with the VIVAMAYR PURE programme and allows guests to add modules around areas such as gut health, mental resilience, recovery and performance, health checks and healthy ageing. 

Its Healthy Aging & Longevity module combines medical diagnostics with individually selected interventions and is designed to complement the core programme rather than operate as a standalone stay. 

5. Chenot Palace Weggis – Switzerland

Chenot Palace Weggis sits on Lake Lucerne and offers a selection of structured medical-wellness programmes based around the Chenot Method.

Its current programme menu includes Prevention & Ageing Well, Body Insights & Optimisation, Recover & Energise and its signature Advanced Detox programme. Diagnostic tests and medical consultations are built into the wider Chenot approach.

Its Body Insights & Optimisation programme is particularly relevant to longevity-minded guests because it centres on diagnostics and functional testing.

6. SHA – Spain

SHA has built an international reputation around combining medical assessment, nutrition and broader wellbeing programmes.

Its Spanish clinic offers programmes spanning rejuvenation, fitness, stress, sleep, weight management and healthy lifestyle support. Its rejuvenation offering incorporates preventative medicine alongside other therapies. 

The style here is broader than classic Mayr Medicine, bringing together several different aspects of health within one programme.

7. MAYRLIFE – Altaussee, Austria

MAYRLIFE sits directly on Lake Altaussee and is another significant provider within the Austrian Mayr category.

Its dedicated Longevity & Healthy Aging programme currently starts from seven nights and combines personalised medicine, diagnostics and therapies with a strong emphasis on nutrition and gut health.

The resort places particularly strong emphasis on individually tailored nutrition as part of its wider medical concept.

8. Park Igls – near Innsbruck, Austria

Park Igls is another long-established name in Modern Mayr Medicine.

Its approach combines medical diagnostics with Mayr principles and individually selected nutrition, movement and therapy programmes. The resort describes prevention, relaxation, fitness and digestive health among its main areas of focus. 

A detailed initial medical examination is used to help establish an individual therapy plan for the stay. 

So, how are these places actually different?

On paper, many longevity resorts can sound remarkably similar.

Nearly everyone talks about prevention. Most mention nutrition. Diagnostics are increasingly common. And practically every provider now talks about personalisation.

The more useful way to compare them is to look at where each provider starts.

Lanserhof leans heavily into advanced longevity diagnostics. Clinique La Prairie has built its identity around regenerative medicine and its long-established Swiss clinic. Chenot has its own highly structured method, while SHA takes a broader integrative approach.

Then you have the Austrian Mayr resorts, where digestion and nutrition play a much more central role.

Within that group, Original Mayr Medical Resort is particularly interesting because of the combination of its direct Mayr heritage, medically guided diagnostics, gut-health focus and relatively private lakeside setting. Its positioning is less about collecting the maximum possible number of tests and more about using medical information to create clearer, individually relevant guidance. 

Don't book based on the longest list of tests

It is easy to look at a longevity programme and assume that more testing must mean a better programme.

That isn't necessarily the case.

Tests need context. Screening can produce false positives as well as useful findings, and some measurements marketed within the longevity industry are still developing as tools for predicting long-term health.

A more useful set of questions would be:

• Why is this test being recommended for me?
• Who will interpret the result?
• Will the finding change my treatment or lifestyle recommendations?
• What happens if something unexpected is discovered?
• What support is there after I go home?

The last question is particularly important.

A week in Austria or Switzerland might create the space to focus on health, but most of your life will still be lived at home. A useful programme should therefore help translate what has been learned into something practical.

What would we look for in a longevity resort?

For us, the interesting part of longevity medicine isn't the promise of “beating ageing”. It is the possibility of understanding health earlier and more clearly.

That means we'd pay more attention to the quality of medical interpretation than to the number of gadgets in the building.

A provider that can explain what your results mean, what matters, what doesn't and what you can realistically do next is arguably offering something more useful than one that simply provides a huge diagnostic report.

That is one reason Original Mayr Medical Resort makes an interesting case within this list. Its Diagnostic & Prevention programme explicitly connects medical diagnostics with prevention planning, while its wider Mayr concept provides a defined framework around gut health, nutrition and lifestyle. 

And the location doesn't hurt either: the resort sits directly on Lake Wörthersee, giving the medical programme a very different atmosphere from a traditional clinic.

©Original Mayr Medical Resort

Final thoughts

Longevity medicine in Europe ranges from ultra-premium Swiss clinics to Austrian medical resorts built around decades-old preventive-health traditions.

The important thing is not to assume that every provider means the same thing when it uses the word longevity.

For some, it means advanced biomarker testing. For others, cellular medicine, nutrition or lifestyle optimisation. And at Mayr-focused resorts, digestive health may provide the foundation for the wider programme.

If you're particularly interested in understanding how gut health, nutrition, diagnostics and prevention fit together, Original Mayr Medical Resort is one of the more distinctive options to investigate. Its strength is not simply that it offers tests, but that the medical concept is built around interpreting those findings and turning them into individual guidance.

Ultimately, the most valuable outcome from a longevity stay probably isn't being told how old your body supposedly is.

It's coming home with a better understanding of it.

FAQ

How long do you normally need to stay at a longevity resort?

It varies. Seven nights is common among the providers in this guide, although some offer shorter checks or longer programmes. Original Mayr's Diagnostic & Prevention programme starts at seven days, while Lanserhof also offers shorter four-day diagnostic retreats at Sylt. 

Are longevity resorts the same as medical clinics?

Not exactly. Medical resorts combine elements of clinical assessment with accommodation, nutrition, movement and other parts of a residential stay. The amount of medical supervision varies considerably between providers, so it is worth checking who performs and interprets your tests.

Do I need to have a health problem before visiting one?

No. Many programmes are designed around prevention rather than treating an existing illness. That said, anyone with a medical condition or taking medication should discuss major dietary changes, fasting or intensive treatments with an appropriate healthcare professional beforehand.

Why are so many longevity resorts located in Austria and Switzerland?

Both countries have long traditions of medical spa and preventive-health tourism. Austria is particularly prominent in this guide because several leading resorts practise Mayr Medicine, which originated in Austria and places a strong emphasis on digestive health.

Is a longevity retreat proven to make you live longer?

No reputable short-term programme can guarantee that. The more realistic purpose is to assess aspects of your current health, identify relevant risk factors and provide individually appropriate guidance that may support long-term health. Any claim that a one-week stay can directly prove an increase in lifespan should be treated cautiously.