In Search of Sun, Sand and Surgery

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
(Free-Press-Release.com) April 8, 2010 -- Asian holidaymakers are lining up for a dose of sun, sand and surgery through medical tourism which is looming as one of Asia's fastest growing business ventures. Jetsetting patients are having everything from gallstone operations to teeth pulled between snorkelling trips, rounds of golf and Elephant trekking.

Forty-seven million uninsured Americans are looking increasingly to the medical tourism market for affordable medical care because they are unable to secure a job with health care benefits and are unable to afford an individual health plan. Consider the cost saving for a coronary artery bypass (CABG) operation, says Tongjai Chanparn, Director of Case Management at Medbirds, a U.S. based medical tourism facilitator that connects patients to hospitals overseas (http://www.medbirds.com). At the high-end, the asking price for a CABG in America is $90,000. For the uninsured--those with the least negotiating power--hospitals actually attempt to collect this amount of money. To the extent that hospitals succeed in collecting from the uninsured, the hospitals' actions are likely to stimulate more personal bankruptcy filings. On the other hand, an uninsured patient who travels to Thailand or India can purchase a CABG operation for as little as $9,000. Given such cost savings, even with the addition of transportation costs to the foreign country, it is estimated that 30 percent of all American patients in need of an elective CABG could be enticed to purchase this service abroad. Thus, it is not surprising to learn that in 2006, 500,000 Americans traveled abroad to purchase surgical procedures at prices 30-80 percent below those found in America.

Critics deride medical tourism as a fad. In part, this is because critics assume that all of the surgery purchased overseas is cosmetic. This is of course untrue because in addition to CABG, almost any medical surgical procedure can be performed at a discount in the medical tourism market, and, in fact, most medical tourists go abroad for non-costmetic procedures such as hip replacements and knee operations. Critics are also dismissive of medical tourism because they fail to perceive medical tourism for what it is: A new patient paradigm for purchasing health care services. Today's surgery patients do not seem to care if their doctor is local and home-grown, so long as he is otherwise amply skilled and eminently qualified to perform the procedure. Today's patients care more about avoiding bankruptcy and the ability to purchase convenient health care services at an affordable price. These newer patient demands have created a greater willingness among patients to receive health care from foreign providers. SUN, sand and surgery
Author: Conrad Crane
Medical Care International, Inc.

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