The Medical Travel Guide

Medical travel has become one of the fastest growing global industries. It is a natural phenomenon based on the abundance of inexpensive nursing, real estate, medical services and quality physicians.

Over the past 8 years, the developing countries with a far lower cost basis for land, buildings, electricity and labor, have established very successful centers for treating the full spectrum of illnesses and surgeries. Among the more popular procedures are weight loss, cosmetic surgeries, dental procedures, and the full range of orthopedic surgeries.

There are many reasons patients elect to travel abroad or to neighboring countries for medical care. The most predominant reasons for medical travel are as follows:

Cost Savings – the savings that can be achieved by engaging in medical travel can be as high as 75 – 80 % of the costs for the same procedure at home. This saving includes all travel expenses, hotels, hospital and physicians fees.

No Medical Insurance – Roughly 46 million Americans are without medical insurance. This means that the dramatic cost savings offered by medical travel can be extremely appealing to those without medical coverage.

Elective Surgeries – Many of the cosmetic procedures, gender reassignment, weight loss procedures, dental surgeries and plastic surgeries are generally not covered by traditional insurance plans. The attraction of big savings coupled with strong quality assurances by reputable international accreditation agencies, is proving to be a major draw for many international medical travelers.

International Accreditation – Over the past 5 or 6 years several very highly regarded international accreditation agencies have conducted stringent assessments of facilities throughout the United States, Europe, Asia, Central and South America and Africa and the Middle East. In addition to the accreditation of these facilities, major US and European based facilities have endorsed foreign facilities as well as developed affiliations with international facilities. Some of the names of these institutions include: Johns Hopkins International; Harvard Medical School, Cleveland Clinic; University of Pittsburg Medical Center.

Availability of New Procedures – There are constantly a host of new treatments and procedures being applied which are not yet available in the developed countries. These include AIDS treatments, stem cell therapy, bone resurfacing and others.

Urgency – Many Western European countries and Canada have national health programs that have long waiting lists for procedures like hip and knee replacements and many others. Patients who can afford it often opt for medical travel as a good solution to not waiting for several years for their procedure to be made available.

Tourism and Vacations – Since many of these treatment centers are located in exotic locations like Thailand, India, South Africa, Philippines, medical travelers often take full advantage of these locales by enjoying safaris, spas, beach vacations as a prelude or during their recovery phase before returning home.

Popular Destinations

The most popular destinations for medical travelers are Thailand, India, Philippines, South Korea, Malaysia, China, South Africa United Arab Emirates. Also, many Eastern European countries like Poland, Ukraine, Turkey, Romania have developed thriving businesses specializing on cosmetic and dental surgeries. Recently, Mexico, Costa Rica, Brazil and Argentina have also been aggressively pursuing medical travel business.