Home / Alcohol & drug addiction
Drug and alcohol addiction
Drug addiction treatment in Spain
A licensed 28-day residential programme in the Málaga countryside, run by an English-speaking team, for people who have tried to stop on their own and found that willpower alone does not hold.
A private room as standard, a price published in full, and no referral fees paid to anyone for sending you here.
Checked for accuracy on 28 July 2026. Next review due July 2027. This page is general information about our programme and is not a substitute for advice about your own situation.
Drug addiction is treated at Sierra Recovery as a 28-day residential programme in the Málaga countryside, published in full at £9,900. Where you are physically dependent, a medically supervised withdrawal is completed in an appropriate medical setting before you arrive, because we are a registered health centre and not a hospital. What follows is three structured group sessions a day, one-to-one therapy, a seventeen-module curriculum and an aftercare plan agreed before you leave. Every substance we treat has its own page below, setting out what is distinctive about treating it.
Programme
28 days residential
Published price
£9,900
Group work
3 sessions a day
Room
Private, as standard
Language
English throughout
Registration
N.I.C.A. 67331
What drug addiction actually is
Addiction is not defined by what you take, how often, or how much. It is defined by the loss of the ability to choose. The clinical criteria describe it plainly: use that continues despite harm, tolerance, withdrawal, repeated unsuccessful attempts to cut down, and a life progressively organised around obtaining and recovering from the drug.
What that definition deliberately leaves out is character. Nobody arrives here having chosen this. What people describe instead is a slow narrowing, in which something that started as a choice becomes the fixed point the rest of the week is arranged around. The reason willpower alone tends to fail is that dependence changes the reward system itself, so the comparison is no longer between a drug and an ordinary pleasure. It is between a drug and feeling wrong.
At Sierra we treat addiction as a learned way of regulating an internal state that has become unbearable. That is not a softer framing than the medical one. It is a more useful one, because it tells you what has to be built before the drug can be given up: another way of doing the job the drug was doing.
Withdrawal from alcohol, benzodiazepines and z-drugs can cause seizures and can be life threatening. Opioid withdrawal is rarely fatal but overdose risk rises sharply afterwards because tolerance falls. Speak to your GP before stopping anything. In an emergency call 999 in the UK or 112 anywhere in Europe, or NHS 111 for urgent advice that is not an emergency.
What we treat, and where to read about it
Every substance below has its own page setting out how it is assessed, whether a medically supervised withdrawal is needed first, and what the four weeks actually involve.
| Substance | What is distinctive about treating it |
|---|---|
| Alcohol | The most common presentation here, and one of the few withdrawals that can kill. A medically supervised detox is arranged before admission wherever there is physical dependence. |
| Cocaine and crack | Rarely needs a medical detox on its own. The hard part is the flat, joyless window in the weeks after stopping, which is exactly what a residential month is built for. |
| Heroin and opioids | Physical dependence and a medical detox before admission. Overdose risk after any drop in tolerance is named explicitly in the relapse plan. |
| Fentanyl and synthetic opioids | The narrowest margin of any drug we treat, made worse by an unpredictable supply. Naloxone and harm reduction are part of the plan from day one. |
| Benzodiazepines | Never stopped abruptly. A supervised taper measured in weeks or months, usually after conversion to a longer-acting drug. |
| Xanax and alprazolam | Short acting, so tolerance and interdose withdrawal arrive faster. Frequently bought online in the UK, where the tablets are often not what they claim to be. |
| Prescription medication | Usually began with a legitimate prescription. The condition the medication was treating has to be addressed alongside the dependence. |
| Cannabis | Dependence is real and withdrawal is difficult rather than dangerous. Potency has changed the picture substantially. |
| Methamphetamine | Binge and crash patterns, psychosis risk, and frequently a chemsex context that has to be treated as part of the whole. |
| Ketamine | Bladder damage is the harm that becomes permanent. The dissociation is usually doing a job that has to be understood. |
| Synthetic drugs | Spice, monkey dust, nitazenes and novel benzodiazepines. Nobody knows what is in the packet, which changes how the plan is built. |
| Behavioural addictions | Gambling, gaming and compulsive behaviours. No substance to remove, so the psychological work starts on day one. |
The signs, whatever the drug
| What you might notice | What it usually means |
|---|---|
| Needing more for the same effect | Tolerance. It is the earliest reliable signal across every substance. |
| Feeling ill, anxious or flat when you stop | Withdrawal. With some drugs this is dangerous, which is why assessment comes before anything else. |
| Repeatedly deciding to cut down and not managing it | The gap between intention and behaviour is the definition of the disorder, not a failure of character. |
| The week organised around when you can use | The drug has moved from something you do to the structure of the week. |
| Using alone, when it started socially | One of the clearest markers that the function has changed. |
| Continuing despite what it is costing you | The core clinical criterion, and the one people recognise last. |
| Using to manage anxiety, low mood or memories | The drug is doing a job. Treating only the using, and not the job, is why people relapse. |
If several of those land, our four-question self-check takes under a minute, stores nothing, and will tell you whether a fuller conversation is worth having.
Where the treatment actually happens
People ask for photographs before they ask about therapy, and they are right to. You are deciding whether you could live somewhere for a month. This is the place, not a stock library.
See the full gallery · how people get here.
Detox comes first, and it happens before you arrive
This is where we differ from clinics that blur the line, and it matters more than any marketing claim on this page. Sierra Recovery is entered in the Registro Andaluz de Centros, Servicios y Establecimientos Sanitarios (the Andalusian register of health centres, services and establishments) under N.I.C.A. 67331, authorised by the Junta de Andalucía for the care unit atención sanitaria a drogodependientes (healthcare for drug dependency, authorised care unit U.71). That is a registered health centre with a supervised treatment residence. It is not a hospital and it is not a detox unit.
In practice: your assessment happens before you book a flight. If it shows you are physically dependent, a medically supervised withdrawal is arranged in an appropriate medical setting and completed before admission, billed separately from the programme fee. Qualified nursing is part of the team during your stay. If the assessment says a more intensive medical setting is the safer choice for you, we say so and we do not admit you. You can check our registration yourself on the Junta's public register.
Not sure whether you need a detox first?
The assessment answers that before you commit to anything, and it happens before you travel. A clinician will tell you honestly if we are the wrong setting for you.
What a day here looks like
Nobody arrives knowing how twenty eight days are actually spent. This is the real timetable, Monday to Friday.
| Time | What happens |
|---|---|
| 08:00 | Breakfast, cooked by a Michelin-trained chef |
| 09:15 | Planning: the day is set out together |
| 10:30 | Process group, the harder one |
| 12:00 | Therapeutic group |
| 13:15 | Lunch |
| 14:30 | Psychoeducation, working through the curriculum |
| 16:00 | Group activity, often outdoors or with the horses |
| 18:30 | Dinner |
| 20:00 | Day closing, together |
Saturdays turn to holistic and body-based work. Sundays are a supervised excursion, because reconnecting with the world outside a clinic is part of the treatment rather than a break from it.
What the treatment actually involves
The programme runs Monday to Friday on a fixed structure, with Saturdays given to holistic and body-based work and Sundays to a supervised excursion. Rather than list therapy names, here is what each part of the week is for.
Three group sessions a day, five days a week
The day opens with a process group at 10:30, a second therapeutic group runs at midday, and a psychoeducation session follows lunch. A group activity fills the late afternoon and the day closes together in the evening. That is roughly fifteen structured group contacts a week, which is the part most people underestimate before they arrive and value most afterwards.
Groups are small, in English, and run by the clinical team. Hearing someone else describe your own thinking back to you does something that individual work cannot, and it is the fastest route out of the isolation that addiction builds.
A seventeen-module curriculum, not a rest cure
The psychoeducation strand moves through a fixed seventeen-module curriculum written by our clinical director. It is the core of what we call the Regulation Model, which is our adaptation of the PROMIS Clinics methodology to this centre rather than a model of our own invention. It covers skills training, communication styles, boundaries and decision-making, trigger recognition, self-esteem and self-concept, dual diagnosis, self-care and habits, emotions, crisis identification and management, suicide prevention, goals, grief, values, trauma and relapse, perfectionism, loneliness and isolation, and cross-addiction. Every module runs the same structure: check-in, theory, an experiential dynamic, shared reflection, and a commitment carried into the week.
The cognitive work uses the ABC model, the same structure that underpins cognitive behavioural approaches: the event, the belief you attach to it, and the consequence that follows. It is taught, practised, applied between sessions and reviewed, rather than talked about once.
Individual therapy alongside the group programme
One-to-one sessions run three times a week and are where the material that will not surface in a group gets worked. For most people that is the thing underneath the use rather than the use itself.
You are treated by the same small team throughout, in the same house. Nobody is handed between departments, and there is no rotation of therapists mid-stay.
Yoga, meditation and body-based work
Saturdays turn to holistic and body-based practice: yoga, meditation and mindfulness, breathwork, art, and time outdoors on the land. This is not decoration and it is not a spa timetable. Early recovery is a physiological event as much as a psychological one, and sleep, appetite and the ability to sit still are usually the first things to return.
The self-care and habits module runs alongside it, treating rest as a right rather than a reward and food as connection rather than control.
Equine therapy on working farmland
The horses live here, on the forty hectares around the house, and equine work is part of the working week. Horses respond to what you are actually feeling rather than what you say you are feeling, which is why the work reaches people who have learned to talk their way around a therapy session.
What happens when you go home
Aftercare is planned before you leave rather than mentioned on the last day. For clients returning to the UK, care continues online or in person at the PROMIS clinics in London, with a weekly session for a full year, more than 48 in the twelve months after discharge, and a written handover to your GP so nothing has to be explained from scratch. For clients elsewhere in Europe we arrange continuity online and help find local services.
Alongside that, mutual-aid groups are free, run everywhere, and are worth using whatever else you choose.
Who will actually treat you
A small team, in one house, in English. You are not handed between departments and there is no rotation of therapists halfway through your stay.
Nerea Encinas Sánchez
Director · General Health Psychologist
MSc General Health Psychology. Leads clinical standards, the assessment you have before you travel, and admissions.
Berenice Paramés Jones
General Health Psychologist
Individual and group psychological work inside the house, crisis follow-up and coordination of the group programme.
Marta Leal
Social worker
Family mediation, links to services back home, and preparing for independent life after discharge.
Robin Lefever
Founder of Sierra Recovery; MD, PROMIS Clinics UK
Founder of Sierra Recovery and Managing Director of PROMIS Clinics, whose method this programme adapts. PROMIS has been treating addiction in the United Kingdom since the mid-1980s, and Robin has worked in addiction treatment for around 35 years, with thousands of patients treated with the PROMIS method in the United Kingdom.
Meet the whole clinical team and their qualifications.
Treatment options for drug addiction, and how they compare
Residential rehab is one treatment option among several, and it is not automatically the right one. Being straight about that is more useful to you than a page that pretends otherwise.
| Option | What it involves, and who it suits |
|---|---|
| Medical detox | Required wherever there is physical dependence, most importantly with alcohol, opioids and benzodiazepines. Completed before admission and billed separately. |
| Residential rehab inpatient treatment | Living at the centre for the whole programme. It suits people for whom stopping at home has already failed, where the environment sustains the use, or where a mental health condition sits alongside untreated. |
| Outpatient treatment day programmes and therapy sessions | Attending sessions and going home between them. Often the proportionate first step where home is stable and supportive and this is a first structured attempt. |
| Community and NHS services | Free local drug and alcohol treatment services, reached through your GP or by self-referral. Waiting times vary and residential placements are rationed, but the support is real and it costs nothing. For many people this is the right first step rather than a lesser one. |
| Mutual aid and support groups | Free peer support meeting in person and online, everywhere, with no waiting list and no cost. Worth using alongside whatever else you choose rather than instead of it. |
A treatment plan should be built around your circumstances. If an outpatient or community route fits you better, we will say so at assessment and we will not charge you for the conversation.
The therapies used, in plain terms
Every centre lists the same acronyms, so here is what each one actually is and where it appears in the week.
| Therapy | What it is, and when you would meet it here |
|---|---|
| Cognitive behavioural therapy CBT, and the related REBT | Evidence-based work on the link between an event, the belief you attach to it and what you then do. Taught through the ABC model in psychoeducation, practised in group therapy and applied between sessions. It is the backbone of the cognitive work rather than an optional extra. |
| Acceptance and commitment therapy ACT | Learning to have a difficult feeling without having to act on it, and choosing behaviour by your values instead. Module eight, on emotions, is built on it. |
| Dialectical behaviour therapy DBT | Distress tolerance, emotional regulation and interpersonal skills, used where emotions arrive faster and larger than they can be managed. See DBT. |
| EMDR | A structured trauma therapy, used where trauma is driving the use and always after stabilisation rather than before it. See EMDR. |
| Group therapy | Three group sessions a day, five days a week: a process group, a therapeutic group and psychoeducation. It is the largest single component of the treatment programme. See group therapy. |
| Individual therapy one-to-one counselling | Three therapy sessions a week with the same clinician throughout, where material that will not surface in a group gets worked. |
| Family therapy | Offered where it is wanted, in person or online, because the people around you are part of what happens next. See the family programme. |
| Motivational interviewing | Used throughout rather than booked as a session. It is the stance the team takes: working with your reasons for change rather than arguing you into someone else’s. |
| Holistic therapies | Yoga, mindfulness and meditation, breathwork, art and equine work, on Saturdays and through the week. See equine therapy and all our therapies. |
Every element above is delivered by the clinical team as part of the residential programme. Your treatment plan sets out which of them apply to you, and it is reviewed during the stay rather than fixed on day one.
Where else to get help, free
Not everyone needs residential rehab, and nobody should be waiting on a private programme before they get any support at all. Everything below is free, and none of these organisations pays or receives a fee from us.
| Organisation | What they do |
|---|---|
| NHS drug and alcohol services | Free local treatment services, reached through your GP or by self-referral. The usual starting point for community-based drug and alcohol treatment. |
| Talk to FRANK | Confidential drugs information and advice, 24 hours a day, on 0300 123 6600. No judgement and no cost. |
| Narcotics Anonymous | Free mutual aid meetings for anyone with a drug problem, in person and online, with no cost and no waiting list. |
| We Are With You | Free, confidential support for drug, alcohol and mental health problems, in person in many areas and by webchat. |
| Adfam | Support and information for families and friends affected by someone else’s drug, alcohol or gambling use. |
| Samaritans | Free and confidential, 24 hours a day on 116 123, for anyone struggling to cope or having thoughts of suicide. |
Sierra Recovery neither pays nor accepts referral fees, so nothing on this list depends on where you go. If a free or community service is the right fit for you, use it.
How to get ready
- Compare on licence, not on photographsAsk any centre abroad for its registration number and the register it sits on, then look it up yourself. Ours is N.I.C.A. 67331 on the Junta de Andalucía register.
- Get the medical picture togetherCurrent medications, any previous withdrawal, and any diagnosed conditions. This is what the pre-travel assessment needs, and it is what decides whether a detox is required first.
- Ask what the price actually includesOurs is published: private room, meals, the core therapy programme, and a year of weekly UK aftercare, with medical, psychiatric, laboratory and hospital costs quoted separately. You get an itemised written quotation before admission.
- Be complete about everything you useEvery drug, every prescription, and alcohol. This is not a moral inventory. It is what decides whether a medically supervised withdrawal is needed before you fly, and an incomplete list is a safety problem.
- Decide what you want to be differentNot "stop using", which is the outcome, but what you want back. People who arrive with that answer do measurably better in the groups.
How Sierra compares with private drug rehab at home
| What you get | Sierra Recovery | Typical private residential clinic |
|---|---|---|
| 28-day residential programme | £9,900, published in full | UK £12,000–£40,000 · Australia A$30,000–A$50,000 |
| Is the price on the website | Yes, in full | Usually "contact us for pricing" |
| Your own private room | Included as standard | Often an upgrade |
| Referral fees paid to third parties | None | Common |
| Written itemised quotation before admission | Yes | Varies |
| Distance from the people and places tied to use | Rural Andalucía | Usually close to home |
| Medically supervised detox | Arranged and quoted separately | Quoted separately |
Comparison figures are the published ranges collected on our cost calculator: the United Kingdom at roughly £12,000 to £40,000 a month, Australia at roughly A$30,000 to A$50,000, and the United States at roughly $20,000 to $40,000 for a 30-day programme. New Zealand, South African and Canadian ranges are set out on the country cost guides. Indicative, not a quotation. Every clinic sets its own fees.
When drug use sits on top of something else
It usually does. Depression, anxiety, ADHD, trauma and untreated grief all appear repeatedly underneath addiction, and treating the using while sending the rest elsewhere rarely holds. At Sierra the emotional and trauma work runs alongside the addiction curriculum rather than after it. See dual diagnosis, trauma and addiction and mental health. Where psychiatric care or medication is part of your treatment, it is arranged through the appropriate medical route.
When is it time?
There is no threshold you have to cross to deserve help, and waiting for one is how years pass. If the using has stopped being a choice, that is enough. The earlier the conversation happens, the more options are still open, and the less likely it is that a hospital detox will be needed first.
Talk to a clinician today
You will speak to our admissions team, all of them clinicians. Confidential, no obligation, and we will tell you honestly whether this programme fits or whether something closer to home would serve you better.
Questions people actually ask
Which drugs do you treat?
Alcohol, cocaine and crack, heroin and other opioids, fentanyl and synthetic opioids, benzodiazepines including Xanax, prescription medication including opioid painkillers and gabapentinoids, cannabis, methamphetamine, ketamine, synthetic drugs such as spice and monkey dust, and behavioural addictions including gambling. Each has its own page setting out how it is treated.
Do you provide detox?
No. Sierra is a registered health centre with an authorised addiction healthcare unit, not a hospital or a detox unit. Where a medically supervised detox is needed it is completed in an appropriate medical setting before your residential stay begins, arranged as part of your assessment and billed separately. Qualified nurses are part of the team during your stay.
How long is the programme and what does it cost?
It is a 28-day residential programme, published in full at GBP 9,900. That covers a private room, meals, the core therapy programme, and a year of weekly UK aftercare. Hospital detox, if you need it, is arranged and billed separately, as are medical, psychiatric and laboratory costs. You get an itemised written quotation before admission.
I use more than one drug. Is that a problem?
It is the norm rather than the exception, and the programme is built for it. What it changes is the medical plan, because combinations of alcohol, benzodiazepines and opioids often need reducing in a particular order rather than all at once. That sequencing is decided by the medical team managing your withdrawal, which is why the full list matters at assessment.
Why go abroad for treatment?
Three reasons that hold up. Distance from the people, places and supply tied to the using, which is difficult to achieve at home. A published price well below typical private residential rates in the UK, Australia or the United States. And a small centre where the same team treats you throughout rather than a large facility with rotating staff. It is not the right answer for everyone, and the assessment is where that gets decided honestly.
Do you pay referral fees?
No. We neither pay nor accept fees for referrals, which means nobody has a financial interest in telling you Sierra is the right place for you. If we are not, we will say so.
How do I get help for drug addiction?
The first step towards recovery is an assessment, and ours is free and carries no obligation. You can also seek help through your GP, through a free local drug and alcohol treatment service, or through a mutual aid group, and none of those routes costs anything. If you want to talk it through with a clinician, call +44 1202 653136 and you will reach our admissions team.
What does drug addiction treatment involve, from start to finish?
The course of treatment runs in four stages. An assessment before you travel, which decides whether a medically supervised detox is needed first. Any detox, completed in an appropriate medical setting and billed separately. Then the 28-day residential treatment programme itself: three group therapy sessions a day, individual therapy three times a week and the seventeen-module curriculum. Then aftercare, agreed before you leave and continuing online or in person in London.
How much does drug rehab cost, and what affects the price?
Sierra publishes a single figure: GBP 9,900 for the 28-day residential programme, with a private room included. What changes the total is whether you need a medically supervised detox, which is arranged and billed separately, and any medical, psychiatric or laboratory costs. Private residential rehab elsewhere commonly runs from around GBP 12,000 to GBP 40,000 a month in the United Kingdom and from roughly A$30,000 to A$50,000 in Australia. You get an itemised written quotation before admission, and we neither pay nor accept referral fees.
What are the signs and symptoms of drug addiction?
Across every substance the clinical markers are the same: tolerance, withdrawal, repeated unsuccessful attempts to cut down, and continuing despite what it is costing you. What differs is which withdrawals are dangerous, and that is what the assessment establishes.
Is lasting recovery from drug addiction actually possible?
Yes, and the evidence is better than the public conversation suggests. What predicts long-term recovery is not willpower but what is in place afterwards: continuing therapy, a treated mental health condition, a support network and a relapse plan that was written before it was needed. That is why completing drug rehab matters less on its own than what follows it, and why aftercare is planned during the stay, so it is in place before you leave.
How can I help someone with drug addiction?
Start by getting support for yourself, because living alongside someone with an addiction is its own burden and Adfam and Al-Anon exist for exactly that. Beyond that: raise it when they are not intoxicated, be specific about what you have seen rather than general about what they are, and offer a concrete next step such as an assessment or a call to a free service. Ultimatums delivered in anger rarely work. We speak to families every day and that conversation costs nothing.
+
Talk to a clinician today
You will speak to our admissions team, English-speaking clinicians who know the programme and the people in it. Callback within 24 hours.
Registered health centre. Authorised by the Junta de Andalucía, N.I.C.A. 67331.
