Medical tourism today: What is the state of existing knowledge?

Abstract

One manifestation of globalization is medical tourism. As its implications remain largely unknown, we reviewed claimed benefits and risks. Driven by high health-care costs, long waiting periods, or lack of access to new therapies in developed countries, most medical tourists (largely from the United States, Canada, and Western Europe) seek care in Asia and Latin America. Although individual patient risks may be offset by credentialing and sophistication in (some) destination country facilities, lack of benefits to poorer citizens in developing countries offering medical tourism remains a generic equity issue. Data collection, measures, and studies of medical tourism all need to be greatly improved if countries are to assess better both the magnitude and potential health implications of this trade.

Promoting medical tourism to India: Messages, images, and the marketing of international patient travel

“…However, current research is hampered by limited empirical analysis of the emergence of a global marketplace in health services (Crooks, Kingsbury et al, 2010;Hopkins, Labonté, Runnels, & Packer, 2010;Lunt & Carrera, 2010). By focusing here on the promotional material developed by destination facilities in India, we hope to make a meaningful contribution to careful, critical, and empirically-informed analyses of the medical tourism industry, the creation of a global market-place for health services, and the rise of India as a leading destination for international patients seeking care.…”

A Comprehensive Perspective on Medical Tourism Context and Create a Conceptual Framework

“…The impression will help tourists consider whether the destination matches their mental image and recreational demands. The concept of destination image was evolved from an organic image, through an induced image, to a complex image [36]. These image phases were connected to the functions of promotion, which are informative, persuasive, and remaining.…”

Ethics of care in medical tourism: Informal caregivers' narratives of responsibility, vulnerability and mutuality

“…Medical tourists are individuals who travel abroad with the intention of accessing private medical outside the context of referral from their home health care system (Hopkins et al, 2010;Hanefeld et al, 2013). To date, reliable quantitative data about medical tourism are limited (Connell, 2013).…”