What's called medical tourism - patients going to a different country for either urgent or elective medical procedures - is fast becoming a worldwide, multibillion-dollar industry.
The reasons patients travel for treatment vary. Many medical tourists from the United States are seeking treatment at a quarter or sometimes even a 10th of the cost at home. From Canada, it is often people who are frustrated by long waiting times. From Great Britain, the patient can't wait for treatment by the National Health Service but also can't afford to see a physician in private practice. For others, becoming a medical tourist is a chance to combine a tropical vacation with elective or plastic surgery.
News Target
India wants to increase medical tourism, but it does not yet have the necessary tools to impress patients looking abroad for their health care solutions. However, by earning accreditations, standardizing medical practices, and getting government, hospitals and tourism agencies, India can increase its medical tourism industry to $2.2 billion per year. The wide use of alternative medicine makes India a particularly intriguing destination, and India can bill itself as a holistic health solution. Be sure to read the related article, Rising popularity of medical tourism reveals deterioration of U.S. healthcare system.
CBC News
(CBS) Summertime. It's almost upon us. Millions will be heading out to foreign lands for vacation, adventure, tourism, or just a beautiful beach. But how about hip surgery or a multiple bypass or a facelift?
A growing number of tourists are doing just that: combining holidays with health care. And that's because a growing number of countries are offering first-rate medical care at third-world prices.
Voa News
Many types of medical treatment in India cost a fraction of what they do in the United States and other Western nations, and citizens from these countries are flocking to India by the thousands. Until recently, it was the other way around, as upper-income Indians commonly rushed to America and Europe for sophisticated treatment.
With world-class medical care, equipment and facilities now available in India, patients from the United States and other developed countries are going there for treatment. A number of private hospitals in India offer packages designed to attract foreign patients, with airport-to-hospital bed transfer service, Internet access, and other facilities. Some packages include add-ons, such as a yoga holiday or a trip to the world-famous Taj Mahal.
F.I.C.C.I.
Rajasthan has woken up to the great potential of medical tourism in the desert State with the stakeholders here getting together this past weekend to work out a programme. Though yet to get equipped to the level of Kerala, a destination fully cashing in on medical tourism at present, Rajasthan with its newly developed health care centres and super speciality hospitals could do well in this field in the near future, they feel.
"We are missing out a great deal in this business. Rajasthan should make use of its huge potential," noted Jai Singh, a scion of the Jaipur royal family and Chairman of the Rajasthan Council of FICCI. "We have to get the medical as well as tourism sectors geared up for this multi million business," he said addressing a conference on medical tourism in Rajasthan, organised by the Institute of Health Management Research here.
Express Pharma Pulse
With world class healthcare professionals, nursing care and treatment cost almost one-sixth of that in the developed countries, India is witnessing 30 per cent growth in medical tourism per year. According to a CII-McKinsey study, medical tourism can contribute Rs 5,000-10,000 crore additional revenue for up-market tertiary hospitals by 2012.
India is the most touted healthcare destination for countries like South-East Asia, Middle East, Africa, Mauritius, Tanzania, Bangladesh and Yemen with 12 per cent patient inflow from developing countries. And the most sought-after super-specialties are cardiology, neuro-surgery, orthopaedics and eye surgery.
Embassy of India
'Medical Tourism' can contribute Rs50 to 100bn additional revenue for upmarket tertiary hospitals by 2012, and will account for 3-5 percent of the total healthcare delivery market, says the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII)-McKinsey study on healthcare. The study says that India has immense potential to what is now being called 'medical tourism' as medical costs skyrocket in the developed world.
Travel Daily News
"Medical tourism has discovered the developing countries." Karl Wolfgang Menck has been commissioned to investigate this subject. These countries regard medical tourism as a niche market in the keenly contested field of international tourism. The developments now taking place in this field give an indication of its potential for rapid expansion. The developing countries could be said to be in the process of promoting a market segment that already promised commercial success much earlier.
Back in the 19th century in Egypt the British and the French sought to cure various diseases by taking advantage of the subtropical climate on the banks of the Nile. After the developing countries became independent some of their inhabitants were keen to avail themselves of the medical facilities in the industrialised nations.
Lufkin Daily News
Last winter, Clark talked about a move that had caught on in Europe, where people are traveling to India and Thailand to have surgery because it costs much less there.
At the time, Clark did a poll on the topic. More than three-quarters of people said they would not be willing to go overseas for any kind of surgery.
The Hindu
STARK contrasts are no surprise in urban India, and in the healthcare sector, the difference between what is available (world-class techniques and service, at a price) and what the common denominator urgently needs is no less so. In Mumbai, as in New Delhi, Chennai and Hyderabad, private sector healthcare centres are gleaming "islands of excellence", as the industry calls them, all too often surrounded by seas of medical neglect.
These "islands" - the private healthcare industry in India - are quietly facilitating a revolution. Only seven years from now, the most optimistic industry forecast posits, medical tourists hosted by India can pump Rs. 10,000 crores into our economy. An estimated 1,50,000 such visitors a year already spend about Rs. 1,500 crores in India for treatment.
Sify
New Delhi: Increasing medical tie-ups with several African and South Asian countries and aggressive marketing through the web have dramatically increased the number of foreign medical tourists seeking out the Indian healing touch.
'' The total foreign exchange earned has been multiplying over the years with a dramatic increase in the two years, with our hospital earning over Rs 22 Crore from 2002 to 2005,'' Mallika Mohandas, Chairperson of the Miot Hospitals Group in Chennai told UNI.
Deccan Herald
NRIs and UK nationals are getting attracted to private medical facilities in India that are available for a fraction of what they would cost abroad.
Medical tourism in India is poised to receive a massive shot in the arm following advanced talks between UK's largest holiday tour operator and the Apollo hospital group to offer a package deal for patients wishing to avoid long National Health Service queues at home.
The impending deal means a huge boost in revenues for a vast spread of the Indian owned or managed hospital chain starting from Colombo in Sri Lanka and stretching northwards to New Delhi.
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