HealthAbroad.net: Point of View

Like it or not, medical tourism is here to stay. And unless medicare in the West becomes cheaper and more responsive to the needs of the customers the numbers of foreign patients coming to low cost medical tourism destinations will only go up in the future.  

Cost is obviously a big consideration. An open heart surgery that costs upto $150,000 in the US costs about $10,000 in India with flights, in-country transportation and postoperative vacations thrown in. Foreign patients frustrated with long wait times for non-elective surgery are also going abroad for medical treatment.  

Another big plus for low cost medical tourism is a big cost savings on malpractice insurance. While doctors in many medical destinations pay as little as $4,000 a year for malpractice insurance while American doctors can pay 25 times that amount.

According to the HR Magazine, published by the Society for Human Resource Management, medical tourism could become an option in employer sponsored health plans. The article can only be accessed through subscription but the NY Times reports, that clearly the price of medical tourism appeals to employers who are faced with rising health care costs and operating costs.

According to examples cited in the article “Going the Distance for Health Savings,” the cost of sending a worker overseas for procedures like removing a gallbladder can be at least 50 percent less than that of having the work done in the United States, even if the employer pays for the worker to spend recovery time in a fine hotel.

Questions on quality of healthcare persist but to encourage employees to seek treatment abroad, companies are also willing to give them a percentage of what the savings.  

The rise in medical tourism and the worldwide resurgence of spirituality and traditional healing has seen Ayurveda capture a significant piece of the medical tourism pie in India, CNN reports.

Ayurveda sessions, from a basic head massage to an intense detox scrub and wrap, that can last from 45 minutes to five-and-a-half hours and are priced at 950 rupees ($21) to 10,000 rupees.

Ayurveda products containing a combination of hearbs, spices, flowers and fruits such as saffron, basil and green apple generate a big chunk of the estimated $200 to $300 million alternative therapy market in India’s growing beauty industry.

As the West laps up Eastern philosophies and treatments, firms such as L’Oreal have also shown an interest in incorporating ayurvedic items in the product line.

Indian government authorities have extended the duration of the medical visa or M-VISA from 6 months to 3 years, if the patient’s doctor so wishes. On an MX-VISA, patients will be allowed to bring along a companion.

The Ministry of External Affairs has also directed Indian embassies in 18 countries to expedite paperwork for medical visas and for them to be cleared within 48 hours.

Indian embassies are known to be notoriously slow in processing visas causing much frustration among travelers.

Found a blog which posts first hand accounts of low cost surgery in India. Worth a visit.

Lap Band surgery is used to treat obesity. More on this here.  

After yesterday’s post on the prospects of an “international trade of doctors” driving down medicare prices in the US, comes an article on what would a visa-free world mean for the outsourcing industry in India and the client country. Good read.

Harvard economist Greg Mankiw writes in his blog that a free flow of skilled people from countries like India to the US could impact income inequality in the two countries as well. Inequality in the US would reduce as the wages of the skilled fall in relation to the wages of the unskilled. “… from a US perspective, the economic pie grows larger, and the slices are divided more equally. More efficiency and more equality—a rare twofer,” says Mankiw.

And the very opposite will take place in India: Inequality will rise as the wages of the skilled rise faster than the wages of the unskilled. “Allowing more skilled workers into the US might exacerbate global inequality, even if it enhances global efficiency,” says Mankiw.

Posted in India, USA, Medical Tourism March 14th, 2007 by gaurav | No comments