Medical tourism is when people travel to other countries to receive medical treatments.   Here are some examples of the difference in costs between American medical procedure costs and what a health visitor may expect in another country:

Medical Tourism

Knee Surgery:  U.S.:  $11,692     Medical Tourism:  $1,398
Shoulder Angioplasty: U.S.: $6,720 Medical Tourism:  $2,493
Tourists from the United States, Great Britain, Canada, Australia, and Western Europe are already taking advantage of medical tourism opportunities.  Also known as wellness or health tourism, medical tourism has given people from developed countries the opportunity to combine travel with health treatments at much lesser costs.

The main reason for this is the extraordinary cost savings, with the foreign treatments only costing about a quarter to a third of the cost in the United States.  The foreign price usually even includes food, transportation and recuperation time.

 

Medical tourism, also known as health tourism, has been on the increase for the past several decades.  It has increased at about 25 per cent each year and is expected to continue to grow at that same rate for years ahead.

What U.S. hospitals are involved with health tourism?

Harvard Medical, Cornell Medical School and the Cleveland Clinic are among the names that you would recognize if you were to consider being a health visitor.

While insurers try to reduce people’s medical coverage, people are left under-insured and dealing with out-of-pocket expenses for medical treatment. With health tourism, traveling patients can cut 50 to 80 percent from the usual cost of various medical treatments or surgery.  For instance, heart surgery could cost about $50,000 in the United States. You can get the same procedure from the finest, state-of-the-art hospital in India or Singapore for about $10,000. You may undergo a $250,000 bone marrow surgery in the U.S., but you can get it for $25,000 in India.

 

Thailand, India, Mexico, Malaysia, Singapore, Philippines, South Africa, Costa Rica and Eastern Europe are few of the countries that have successfully established excellent reputations in medical tourism. These countries continue to aggressively court and invite patients from UK, United States, Canada and Europe their superior yet low-cost dental, medical and cosmetic care and exciting vacationing and travel opportunities. Learn more about “what is medical tourism” by visiting the medical tourism websites of these countries.

Health tourism includes a variety of procedures, from hip replacements, to dental work and plastic surgery.

The health visitor also receives the bonus of recuperating in a foreign land, therefore the term “Medical Tourism”

Medical Tourism