Indian Medical Tourism

The term medical tourism is the act of traveling to other countries to obtain medical care that includes dental, alternative medicine, cosmetic, etc. It is a niche tourism market that has been growing at a CAGR of 20.24% according to Grand View Research, Inc., and the global medical tourism market size is expected to reach USD 131.35 billion by 2025.

Indian Medical Tourism Market

Medical Tourism Market Report: 2015 found that India was “one of the lowest cost and highest quality of all medical tourism destinations”. It offers a wide variety of procedures at about one-tenth the cost of similar procedures in the United States.

The majority of medical tourists come from the industrialized countries of the world especially Europe, UK, Middle East, Japan, U.S. and Canada where the cost of medical treatment is very expensive and there are often long waiting times for treatments.

Major share of the market was of Africans (51%) and middle easterners (35%).

Competition

Tourists Segment

A McKinsey article segment tourist into 5 discrete types;

Hot Destinations in India

New Delhi, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Kerala, Karnataka and Maharashtra are fast emerging as the leading states for medical tourism.

Reasons Why India Is a Popular Destination

Indian healthcare industry has made a mark at the global level because of;

o Indian healthcare industry has made a mark at the global level because of high quality of diverse clinical expertise and low costs of treatment.

o The country has the largest pool of doctors and paramedics in South Asia (1 million MBBS doctors. 0.18 million dental surgeons and about 1.8 million nurses).

o We also have a total of 24 JCI accredited and more than 350 NABH accredited hospitals in the country, something that gives us an edge in providing high quality clinical work at affordable prices.

o Strong presence in advanced healthcare e.g. cardiovascular, organ transplants etc. — high success rate in operations.

o Diversity of tourism destinations and experiences.

Key Issues That Affects the Medical Tourism Industry

Conclusion

Indian healthcare businesses are receiving customers from developing and developed countries that need to travel out of their countries for medical procedures and lure them with comparatively cost effective yet good quality. For this to happen, Government should continue to motivate and persist on accreditation and may even link incentives with accreditation so as to reinforce the notion of quality with the umbrella brand of ‘Indian healthcare’. At the end of the day quality matters. The tourism, health, information and communication departments need to work in tandem for efficient patient care and develop medical travel packages that include all costs associated with medical care, air, visa and ground transportation, hotel accommodation, multi-language translator, provision of a cell phone in the destination country for ease of communication, practical assistance from a local company representative at the health-care facility, travel arrangements for a companion, stays in nearby resorts during the post-operative recovery period, vacation to tourist destinations and lastly a follow up consultation at their home country. All this at an affordable cost while catering a high quality care, can definitely boost the Indian medical tourism industry.

Sourced:

1. “Study of problems and challenges faced by medical tourists visiting India”, (IITTM).

2. “International Journal of Multidisciplinary Research” ISSN 2231 5780

3. “Patients beyond borders: A study of medical tourists in four countries” DOI: 10.1177/1468018110380003.

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