Indian Medical Tourism Industry Basics and Its Competitive Positioning

Author(s):  
Nadeem Ahmed Bashir ◽  
Premkumar Balaraman ◽  
Aroop Mukherjee

Medical tourism (MT) may be described as a journey outside the country of residence to receive medical assistance. It must be taken into account that specialized healthcare involves the participation of specialists in the field of medicine such as surgeons, who differentiate medical tourism from wellness and spa tourism. There can be two main forms of medical tourism: surgical and therapeutic. The chapter mainly aims to understand the fundamentals of medical tourism in perspective to focused on its definition, categories, growing trends, drivers, challenges, and quality standards. The specific case of the Indian medical tourism industry and its competitive position is also being discussed in this chapter.

Author(s):  
Jeayaram Subramanian ◽  
Hardik Vachharajani

Medical tourism, perhaps a late 20th century phenomenon, is said to be making a huge impact across the world in many countries, especially in developing world. According to the Medical Tourism Association in the United States, the term “medical tourism” is where people who live in one country travel to another country to receive medical, dental, and surgical care while at the same time receiving equal to or greater care that they could have received at their own country. Many people across the globe are taking to the wheels to various destinations for their medical needs owing to critical reasons like affordability, better access to care at a higher level of quality, etc. Medical tourism is a fast-growing Indo-Pacific region too. The chapter starts with a literature review of the industry followed by identifying the global hubs of medical tourism especially in the Indo-pacific region. It concludes with looking at potentials and challenges of medical tourism industry between India and Australia.


2018 ◽  
Vol 25 (5) ◽  
pp. 1461-1479 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vineet Jain ◽  
Puneeta Ajmera

Purpose Medical tourism encourages the traveling of patients, expert healthcare professionals and promotes cross-border trade in healthcare services. The Indian medical tourism sector is facing new challenges as well as certain ethical and legal issues because of continuous market changes and patient’s requirements while at the same time advancements in current health services have also been observed. It is therefore very important to understand and address the issues of the medical tourists. The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the important factors which can make India an affordable medical tourism destination. Design/methodology/approach In this paper, the factors influencing Indian medical tourism sector have been explored by conducting literature review, they are ranked according to the results of a questionnaire-based survey and further analyzed by using the interpretive structural modeling (ISM) approach. The mutual relationships between these factors were identified to develop an ISM model so as to find out the important factors which can make India an affordable place for medical tourism. Findings The results of the survey and the model show that cost of medical procedures, facilitation, and care, the infrastructure of Indian hospitals, clinical excellence and the competence of doctors and staff are the top level factors. Practical implications It is very important to address the concerns of the patients coming to a developing country like India for availing medical services. This research has evaluated the important factors which can make India an affordable medical tourism destination. Originality/value This research assesses the effects of globalization on delivery of healthcare services in India by conducting critical analysis of the medical tourism industry by collecting original data from the international patients coming to India for different types of medical procedures so that a comprehensive model can be prepared which will help the hospitals and policymakers to improve the processes related to medical tourism.


2021 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 65-83
Author(s):  
Binoy T A ◽  
Monisha A

Medical Tourism in India has emerged as one of the fastest growing segments of the tourism industry despite the global economic downturn.  High cost of treatments in the developed counties, particularly the USA and UK, have been forcing patients from such regions to look for alternative and cost-effective destinations to get their treatments done. The Indian medical tourism industry is presently at a nascent stage, but has enormous potential for future growth and development.  As a significant component of the colossal medical tourism,   Dental Tourism is emerging in the Third World countries, especially in India.  Dental tourists are mainly generated from developed countries such as USA and European countries as theya re looking for developing countries to get their dental treatment coupled with participating in tourism activities.  The lower cost of treatment and availability are the most significant reasons for choosing developing countries as dental tourism destinations.  Dental tourism forms 10 percent of the total Indian medical tourism which is projected to grow at 30 percent to Rs 9,500 crore by 2015.  India produces over 18,000 dentists annually from 238 dental colleges.  The country has around 1,500 oral and maxillofacial surgeons.  A few studies were carried out on various problems faced by the dental tourism industry in India.  The dental  tourist’s perception towards Indian dental tourism industry and their satisfaction level after getting treatment are a few concerns.  This research paper is prepared based on primary and secondary data collected from various sources.  The primary data have been collected from dentists, staff and dental tourists from two famous internationally recognised dental hospitals located in Bangalore, Karnataka.


Author(s):  
Nityanand Sharma ◽  
A. K. Jain ◽  
P. K. Gupta ◽  
Samidha D. Sharma

The Indian Medical Tourism Industry is significantly adding nearly 3% to the total size of healthcare sector of India. Surgical techniques and healthcare technologies have undergone revolutionary changes in past four decades giving way to early adoption of disruptive innovative practices by the quality conscious and low cost medical tourism industry in India. This secondary data based research paper aims at examining the adoption and use of Disruptive Innovative Practices in Medical Tourism Industry in India. It was concluded that Medical Tourism Industry in India is not only suitable but most probable to adopt and use the Disruptive Innovative Practices. The implication of the paper would be the encouragement of further research on disruptive innovative Practices in Medical care in India.


2012 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 299-300
Author(s):  
Mahesh Uniyal ◽  
◽  
Dr Rakesh Kumar Dhodi ◽  
Dr Rashmi Dhodi ◽  
Swati Sharma

Author(s):  
Ajay Kumar Dogra ◽  
Pooja Dogra

The health tourism Industry is witnessing a sudden paradigm shift in last five years. India has become a home of traditional medicine that has been practiced for several thousand years as a part of manav dharma to give relief to the needy and mostly free of cost. With modern diagnostic and treatment facilities, experienced surgeons, one of the largest pharmaceutical industries in world, and a tradition of caring, India provides world class surgical and healthcare facilities, with comparable success rates and prompt service levels. The potential of medical tourism is such that it can even surpass the revenue earned from IT sector. Recognizing the pivotal contribution of medical tourism to the economic development, the Indian Government has initiated numerous measures to promote this vary young industry to attract international tourism. This has motivated to identify recent trends and opportunities in India for the medical and healthcare tourism, and to explore the critical factors which can lead to success of initiatives taken by ministry of tourism for the development of medical tourism in India. Finally paper suggests measures to enhance medical tourism in the country.


2012 ◽  
Vol 61 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
José Luis Pérez Requejo ◽  
Justo Aznar Lucea

Mai prima d’ora i pazienti gravemente malati o con malattie incurabili o croniche, sono stati così esposti a organizzazioni mediche senza scrupoli, che approfittando del loro logico disagio e della loro preoccupazione promettono cure miracolose e trattamenti, facendo pagare enormi somme di denaro per procedure senza alcuna garanzia, alcun reale beneficio e, peggio ancora, con gravi rischi per la salute. Questo articolo discute alcuni casi di pazienti che hanno pagato con la loro salute, spesso irrimediabilmente, o in maniera catastrofica, gli effetti di terapie teoricamente avanzate con cellule staminali di alcuni centri. Ci si è riferiti a diversi paesi che, in tempi anche non remoti, offrono e praticano qualcuno di questi trattamenti, il più delle volte attraverso strategie di marketing dirette e aggressive per i pazienti o le loro famiglie, mostrando reale o fittizi rapporti relativi ad altri pazienti, ma senza previ studi scientifici che avvalorino i risultati dei presunti benefici. In questo articolo, discutiamo alcuni utili suggerimenti e linee guida internazionali per riconoscerli ed evitarli. Inoltre, abbiamo discusso in dettaglio le ragioni specifiche per cui la maggior parte dei medici e clinici sollevino dei dubbi sulla competenza e le ragioni etiche di questi centri e scoraggino i viaggi di questo “turismo medico”. È sempre consigliabile chiedere il consiglio del medico di famiglia o specialista, prima della decisione dei pazienti di ricevere trattamenti dubbi, con la certezza che il paziente avrà sempre la sua comprensione e il supporto emotivo e medico. ---------- Never before seriously ill patients with chronic or incurable diseases have been so exposed to unscrupulous medical organizations that, taking advantage of their logical distress and worry, promise miracle cures and treatments and charge them huge amounts of money for procedures with no guarantee, no real benefits and, even worse, with serious risks to their health. This paper discusses some cases of patients who paid with their health, often irreparably, or catastrophically, the effects of supposedly advanced therapy centers with stem cells. Several countries are mentioned, not always as remote, which offer and practice any of these treatments, most often by direct and aggressive marketing to patients or their families, showing real or fictional accounts of other patients, but without the previous studies and scientific papers that endorse their supposed beneficial results. In this article we discuss some useful hints and international guidelines to recognize and avoid them. Also, we discussed in detail the specific reasons why most doctors and clinics doubt about the competence and ethical reasons of these centers and discourage those “medical tourism” trips. It is always advisable to seek the advice of the family doctor or specialist in charge, before the patients decision to receive dubious treatments, with the assurance that, decide what the patient decide, they will have always his understanding and his emotional and medical support.


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