How Our Program Works

Reservation, Documents, and Evaluation

Once a patient and their family choose Sanctuary Cozumel as their healing destination, the first step is to provide basic contact information: the patient's name, date of birth, phone number, and email, along with the name, phone number, and email of a point of contact. At that stage, the patient also decides whether they want a shared room or a private room, and whether they are coming for a seven-day detox, a 30-day treatment stay, or a three-month discipleship program.

Once that information is received, the reservation is made. Admissions documents are then sent by email, including the rules of the community, what to bring and what not to bring, and the practical details needed before arrival. Those documents are signed by the client through DocuSign and returned to Sanctuary.

After the signed documents are received, the team schedules a phone evaluation with someone from the psychiatric team. This conversation usually lasts about 30 minutes and helps the team understand where the patient is in the healing journey before arrival. That allows Sanctuary to prepare the right medications, the right primary therapist, the right roommate when a shared room is chosen, and an initial treatment protocol for the first few days until the team can make further observations in person.

Traveling to Sanctuary Cozumel

Cozumel was chosen in part because it is one of the most accessible destinations in the world. There are frequent flights into Cancún and Cozumel from many parts of the globe, and many clients are able to find inexpensive and reasonably direct routes from where they live.

The Sanctuary team helps with travel arrangements for those who need support. For clients who still need travel documents such as passports, assistance is available in navigating that process as quickly as possible. The goal is to remove practical barriers so people can focus on getting here.

Clients flying directly into Cozumel are picked up at the Cozumel airport, which is only about five minutes from the clinic. They are brought first to the clinic for registration and admission, and then taken to the residence, which is only a short walk away.

For clients flying into Cancún, the team provides direction for the bus and ferry route through Playa del Carmen to Cozumel. Once they arrive at the Cozumel ferry terminal, Sanctuary arranges pickup there as well, which again is only a few minutes from the clinic.

Arrival, Admission, and First Settling In

When clients arrive, they are registered and admitted at the clinic and then taken to the residence. By that point, the team has already prepared for the basics of their stay: room placement, initial medication planning, therapist assignment, and the first-stage treatment protocol.

The point of this process is not bureaucracy. It is preparation. The more thoughtfully the first steps are handled, the more settled, safe, and ready a client can feel when treatment begins.