Medical tourism: a survey

Studies on health-related mobility have long focused on the South-North migration of patients. Recently, more attention has been paid to movements in the opposite direction, patients from industrialized countries traveling to developing countries in search of health care, also referred to as medical tourism. Factors such as rising health care costs, the aging of the population, long waiting lists for surgeries and globalization in general have driven the recent flow of patients from industrialized countries seeking treatments abroad. On the other hand, some of the factors that have enabled developing countries to offer medical services to foreign patients include lower labor costs, high-quality health care facilities and services at affordable prices.

Although health-related mobility is nothing new, medical tourism is a new tourism niche that has grown considerably over the past decade and many experts in the subject suggest that it will experience an even bigger growth in the upcoming years. The provision of health services can potentially represent an important source of foreign exchange earnings. Nevertheless, critics of medical tourism argue that these state-of-the-art health centers can function as enclaves that satisfy only foreign demand while the local population is relegated to lower quality health services, creating an inequitable two-tier system.

This paper surveys various experiences on medical tourism. Section I, explores the concept, the underlying factors behind this phenomenon, the advantages of this new type of trade and issues regarding data constraints. Subsequently, section II includes experiences of countries that are exporting their health services in Asia, the Middle East and Africa, as well as in Latin America and the Caribbean. Section III then deals with the promotion of medical tourism by the public and private sectors and touches upon the potential repercussions on domestic health care. Finally, section IV presents an overview of the main barriers currently hindering the growth of medical tourism and how they could be overcome.