photos/_pages/institute/hero.jpgELIXIR Field Institute ◆ School of Mobile and Home-Based Care
Fourteen courses and three diplomas in spa therapy, clinical home-based care and spa management — taught inside working houses by the people who run them, to twelve candidates at a time.
The school
The Field Institute grew out of a practical problem: our houses needed nurses who could run an infusion, read a panel and recognise a deteriorating patient in a guest suite, and there was nowhere sensible to send them to learn it.
So candidates train where the work happens. Teaching blocks sit alongside live clinical operations at the five houses, with simulation for everything that should never be rehearsed on a real patient. Cohorts are capped at twelve because the assessment is observational: an instructor watches you work, repeatedly, and writes down what they saw.
Courses
Take a single course, or combine several into a diploma. Fees include tuition, materials and assessment, plus room and board on residential courses. Anatomy and Physiology comes before any practical therapy course — there are no exceptions to that one.
Showing all 14 courses
The first course every clinical candidate takes. Working alone in someone’s home changes the job: what you carry, what you document, how you read a room before you read a chart.
Clinical ◆ 2 weeks · residential
Cannulation in difficult conditions, ultrasound-guided access, infusion pharmacology and the reaction protocols you will one day need with no crash team behind you.
Clinical ◆ 3 weeks · residential
The course that matters most and sells least: recognising the patient who should not be treated at home, and calling a physician early rather than proving you did not need to.
Clinical ◆ 2 weeks · residential
Reading and explaining the panels our houses run — metabolic, hormonal, body composition, VO₂max, biological age — to a guest who has already read the internet.
Clinical ◆ 3 weeks · residential
The theoretical foundation beneath every treatment on the menu, taught to examination standard. Required before any practical therapy course and the most common reason candidates fail later assessments.
Spa and therapy ◆ 60 hours · campus or online
Classical technique taught properly and slowly: pressure, pacing, draping, contraindications, and the endurance to deliver six treatments a day without injuring yourself.
Spa and therapy ◆ 4 weeks · campus
Taught in the lineage tradition at the Hua Hin house: floor work, assisted stretching, sen line theory, and herbal compress preparation from raw ingredients.
Spa and therapy ◆ 5 weeks · Hua Hin
Skin analysis, manual facial protocols, peels and device work within scope, and honest counselling about what a treatment can and cannot achieve.
Spa and therapy ◆ 4 weeks · campus
Water as treatment rather than amenity: thermal bathing, contrast protocols, wraps and compresses, plus the plant, hygiene and testing regime behind them.
Spa and therapy ◆ 2 weeks · residential
What a therapist may and may not advise. Macronutrients, hydration, supplement claims, disordered eating red flags, and when to hand the conversation to a dietitian.
Spa and therapy ◆ 60 hours · campus or online
The complete arc from idea to opening: concept, space planning, wet-area engineering, treatment menu costing, staffing model and the numbers that decide whether it works.
Executive ◆ 30 hours · campus or online
Running the thing once it is open: rostering, yield, retail, therapist retention, quality audit and the reporting a board will actually read.
Executive ◆ 30 hours · campus or online
Positioning, pricing and partnership for independent operators, including how to prepare a house for collection membership or ELIXIR certification.
Executive ◆ 20 hours · online
Clinical and practical teaching, simulation design and assessment. Instructors return for two teaching blocks a year and are paid a day rate for them.
Executive ◆ 6 weeks · by invitation
Nothing in that track. Clear a filter to see the full curriculum.
Diploma programmes
A diploma is not a discount bundle. The courses share one assessment thread, and every diploma ends with supervised practice in a working house rather than a written paper.
The standard qualification for a therapist entering a five-star house. Four courses, one continuous assessment thread, and a supervised placement at a member hotel in the final fortnight.
Anatomy and Physiology ◆ Swedish and Deep Tissue ◆ Facial Therapy ◆ Hydrothermal
Taught largely at Hua Hin, for therapists who want the Thai tradition as their primary practice rather than an item on a menu.
Anatomy and Physiology ◆ Traditional Thai Massage ◆ Hydrothermal
For licensed clinicians only. The full clinical track, ending with a supervised caseload and a written service protocol the candidate authors themselves.
Foundations ◆ Vascular Access ◆ Assessment and Escalation ◆ Longevity Diagnostics
Intakes
Applications close six weeks before an intake, or when the seats are gone — whichever comes first. Courses not listed here run on request for closed cohorts of six or more.
| Course | Dates | Seats | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Anatomy and PhysiologyCampus & online | 12 – 23 January 2027 | 15 seats | Apply |
| Foundations of Mobile CareSotogrande | 26 January – 6 February 2027 | 12 seats | Apply |
| Swedish and Deep Tissue MassageCampus | 9 February – 6 March 2027 | 12 seats | Apply |
| Spa DevelopmentCampus & online | 15 – 19 March 2027 | 18 seats | Apply |
| Traditional Thai MassageHua Hin | 22 March – 24 April 2027 | 10 seats | Apply |
| Vascular Access and Infusion PracticeWest Palm Beach | 12 – 30 April 2027 | 10 seats | Apply |
| Facial Therapy and AestheticsCampus | 4 – 29 May 2027 | 12 seats | Apply |
| Spa ManagementCampus & online | 7 – 11 June 2027 | 18 seats | Apply |
| Diet and Nutrition for TherapistsCampus & online | 14 – 25 June 2027 | 15 seats | Apply |
| Assessment and EscalationNorth | 6 – 17 September 2027 | 12 seats | Apply |
10 scheduled intakes
Recognition
The Institute awards its own certificates and diplomas. They are private qualifications: not a licence, not a state award, and not a substitute for whatever registration your own jurisdiction requires of a therapist or a clinician.
Any school that is vague on this point is worth avoiding, including this one if it ever becomes vague.
Admission
A licence, a CV and 300 words on a patient encounter that went wrong and what you changed afterwards. That last part is what we actually read.
Thirty minutes with a faculty clinician, plus a scenario. We are assessing judgment under uncertainty, not recall.
Two to twelve weeks in residence at a teaching house, alongside live clinical operations.
Observed practice, a written scenario paper and a viva. Roughly one in seven candidates is asked to repeat a block.
Graduates are introduced to the group’s houses and partner practices, and stay on the faculty register for refresher blocks.
Applications are read twice a year, in February and September. Around one in six places carries a bursary, weighted toward candidates returning to underserved regions.
Teaching houses
Clinical Lead candidates rotate through three of the five. The others take their blocks wherever the specialism sits.
We teach nurses to know the moment they are out of their depth, and to say so out loud.
Dr. Marcus Reyes ◆ Dean, Field Institute
Scope of practice. Everything taught here is delivered under the licence you already hold and the law of the jurisdiction you work in, under physician or advanced-practice supervision where that is required. A certificate from this Institute does not broaden either, and we will say so to any employer who suggests otherwise.
Three different people. Therapists and those entering the spa industry take the practical courses and diplomas. Licensed nurses and paramedics take the clinical track. Owners and managers take the executive courses, which assume no clinical background.
It is a certificate or diploma from a private institute, not a licence and not a state qualification. It carries weight because of what a graduate can demonstrate and because member houses hire on it. We will tell you plainly how it is regarded in your jurisdiction before you pay anything.
Our Anatomy and Physiology and Diet and Nutrition syllabi are written to the depth external bodies such as CIBTAC examine at, and candidates regularly sit those examinations afterwards. We are not an approved examination centre and we do not award their qualifications — you register and sit with the awarding body directly, at their fee.
Practical spa courses at the campus, clinical courses inside the working houses, and theory courses either on campus or online in live cohorts. Online courses are taught by the same faculty, not recorded.
Twelve for practical and clinical courses, ten for Thai massage, fifteen to eighteen for theory and executive courses. Assessment is observational, which is what caps the numbers.
We introduce graduates to the collection’s member houses and to partner practices, and diploma graduates are usually hired before they finish. We do not promise placement to anyone.
Tuition, materials, assessment, and room and board for residential courses. Flights, visas, insurance, external examination fees and licence fees are yours. Instalments are available and roughly one place in six carries a bursary.
ELIXIR Field Institute
Write with your licence details and the 300 words. Faculty read every application; you will hear back either way.
Searches this directory only. Not medical advice, and not a booking system.