Save Your Medical Bills With Medical Tourism.

Nowadays you may have come across stories about the increasing phenomenon of medical and health tourism. Patients move around the globe to find medical procedures for getting an appropriate solution to their health related issues. One must have health insurance since traveling to a foreign country seems like paying less if there’s a real chance for good quality and affordable global health care.


Let’s see what exactly medical and health tourism means for an individual?


What is Medical Tourism?


The term “medical tourism” refers to people traveling outside of their own countries for medical care, surgical procedures and dental treatment. Historically, medical tourists were often wealthy and affluent patients seeking treatments or procedures that were unavailable in their own country or looking to combine cosmetic procedures with some rest and relaxation in an exotic locale.


However, recently, increasing numbers of less-affluent patients have begun traveling abroad in an effort to control the costs of their medical care. As the quality of medical facilities and care in other countries become comparable to those of the U.S., medical tourism has become a viable option for some patients seeking to cut their medical costs. For example, surgery in a hospital in Singapore or Latin America may cost a quarter of what an American hospital my charge. Likewise, an Indian hospital may charge $10,000 for the open-heart surgery that would cost $30,000 in the UK and $100,000 in the U.S. Considering the potential savings, it is not surprising that some patients find it much cheaper to pay the travel costs and travel abroad for their care.


In addition, because of the smaller demand for health services in other countries, wait times for procedures may be significantly shorter than in the U.S. In many cases, a major surgery can be scheduled within a few weeks and sometimes even days, a far cry from the situation in most major American hospitals. Some of the most popular destinations for medical tourism are Singapore, Thailand, Indian, Argentina, Brazil, Costa Rica and South Africa.


Who is a Good Candidate for Medical Tourism?


Medical tourism may be a good way to save money, in many cases a lot of money, but it is not without risks. If you are considering medical tourism, you should carefully consider these risks before traveling abroad:


Licensing and Certification. Most importantly, it is important to consider that other countries may not regulate professional licensing and certification as closely as the United States. As with all treatments and procedures, it is important to inspect the credentials of any physician treating you. If your physician claims to be U.S. trained and/or certified, you should be able to find confirm this information fairly easily from whatever organization he or she claims affiliation with.


You should also check to see whether the hospital and facilities you are considering have received accreditation similar to what you may find in the United States. For Americans, the best-known accreditation group is the Joint Commission International (JCI), the international arm of the Joint Commission in the U.S., a non-profit organization that accredits U.S. hospitals. Many hospitals which serve international patients have obtained JCI accreditation in an effort to attract more American patients.


Limited Legal Recourse if Things Go Wrong. In the event that the worse case scenario occurs and something does go wrong, you should also consider that you may have very limited legal options. One reason why the cost of medical care in the United States is so expensive is because of the high costs of the malpractice insurance that American physicians carry. Although you can benefit from the lower costs of foreign care if it is successful, if things go wrong, you may find yourself in a foreign country without any ability to seek compensation for malpractice. Even if you are able to win a malpractice case, the doctor or hospital may not have the money, resources or insurance to cover the financial damages that are awarded to you.


You Need Sufficient Follow-Up and Recovery Time. Some hospitals that specialize in medical tourism are in the business of getting patients in and out quickly. If that is the case, you may not receive the follow-up care necessary for your treatment.


You may have to find that follow-up care on your own at home, which may be a pricey proposition as well as an inconvenient on.


In addition, you need to be very mindful of having sufficient recovery time after receiving treatment. Traveling too soon after surgery can cause serious complications. If you fly, the combination of high altitudes and sitting for long periods of time can cause blood clots and pulmonary embolisms, which are both potentially fatal. Less seriously, you risk swelling and infections. If you have surgery in a foreign country, make sure you do your homework on what kind of recovery time is required before you risk travel.


Exposure to Disease. As with whenever you travel to a foreign country, you do risk exposure to diseases to which you have not built up any immunity. Some countries, such as India, Malaysia, or Thailand have very different infectious disease-related epidemiology to Europe and North America. Exposure to diseases without having built up natural immunity can be a hazard for weakened individuals, specifically with respect to gastrointestinal diseases (e.g. Hepatitis A, amoebic dysentery, paratyphoid) which could weaken progress, mosquito-transmitted diseases, influenza, and tuberculosis


Medical Tourism and Health Tourism consultancy are offered by Global Benefit Options.GBO is a skilled medical tourism consultant with wide industry relationships with insurance companies, brokers and hospitals globally. For more information visit http://www.globalbenefitoptions.com
BY: Vishal Shrama

Important things to Consider before Medical Travel or Medical Tourism

Now days, individuals or even  corporate  have taken  radical steps to save with the high cost of medical care in some countries such as the United States by considering medical tourism, oversee surgeries and medical travel. Many have visited to other destinations or countries to get health care healing at a lower price. This is known as medical travel, health care tourism or medical tourism. In other type of cases individuals in developing or poorer countries travels to a richer country to get medical treatment that is not accessible in their own country. An another motive for medical travel is to go from a country with long waits for some treatments as happens sometimes with national medical care to one with less waiting. Following are few reasons one should consider before setting up medical travel and health tourism.

Firstly, people of expensive medical cost countries, like United States and United Kingdom in specific, can save a lot of medical bills with oversee treatment. Surgeries in India, Cost Rica and Mexico are many times cheaper than in the USA, and the same is valid of many other countries. The expensive can be quite noteworthy, especially for treatment that are not covered by medical insurance, or for individuals who are not insured.

Secondly it is becoming frequent for medical insurance companies, agents or employers who want to cut medical expensive to encourage their consumers or employees to practice medical tourism. In this way they can save a lot of funds this way. They may pay partial refunds, or at least cover transportation and housing.

Thirdly, if someone is worried about the standards of medical care oversees; there is good amount assistance and information available. Many international associations and agencies, including the medical tourism associations study medical care facilities, infrastructure and hospitals around the world. They have grant accreditation to many international centers. The standards of medical treatment are a very complicated issue and may differ a lot within a country or states. Accreditation given to international medical centers at least provides some comfort in knowing there is a lower bound on the worth of an accredited facility. 

Fourthly, be cautions that it may be hard or not possible to get reparation for misconduct in some medical centers in different countries. Occasionally misconduct claims are not permissible or very incomplete. In some cases, a negligence suit may be likely, but it may be very tricky to collect if you even win. Negligence should be exceptional, but it is fine to understand that the covers one has at home might not exist abroad.

Lastly, medical tourism and medical travel has some risks of its own. You might come across some diseases that are seldom if ever present at home. Communicable disease during recovery from operation or other treatments is a risky fixation. But the good thing is that medical care staff in the area you are visiting are certainly familiar with the diseases you could catch while there.

There are even risks from the general traveling. The idiom economy class condition refers to the danger of developing blood clots in the lower body due to being seated and unmoving during a long plane flight. Traveling while recovering from surgery raises the risk of this. This is also the one of the factor to consider when thinking about health travel.

Medical Tourism and Health Tourism may be best alternative for many people, for non-emergency treatments of course. It is regularly used for hip, joint and knee replacement or dental surgery. Cosmetic treatment is another possibility. There are medical tourism consultants and facilitators who could provide guidance at every level. They can guide you about the options available in popular medical tourism destinations. These medical tourism consultants act much like a travel agency and set almost the whole things up for you.

Source: http://health.ezinemark.com/important-things-to-consider-before-medical-travel-or-medical-tourism-32046ad330a.html

What Is Medical Tourism and Heath Tourism?

Medical tourism or Health Tourism (also called medical travel) is the term mainly populated by transport agencies or agents to inform the rapidly growing work of roaming abroad to other countries to acquire medical treatment. It as well refers critically to the work of health care providers wandering internationally to broach health care facilities.
As per the latest survey "Medical Tourism in developing countries like India, Poland, and Mexico", medical tourism in developing countries has emerged as the top growing section of the tourism industry, despite the global economic downturn. The medical tourism industry holds enormous prospective and will be mainly driven by improving tourism & medical infrastructure, increasing accessibility of quality health care services, and low health care costs in developing countries. Many factors such as low cost, government support, and high private investments have contributed to a remarkable growth in the medical tourism market in developing countries.

Can a Captive Program set you free?

Many employers are faced with the rapidly growing cost of health insurance, second only to payroll.  The average cost for family coverage is almost $13,000 a year.  Larger employers are capable of taking control of their costs because most of them are self insured.  Since this allows for transparency, large employers can implement wellness programs targeted at what their true problems are.

Most mid-sized employers are fully insured and do not have the product options that their larger counterparts have available.  They do not know what claims they have or where their premium dollars go.  The lack of transparency prevents them from taking control of the cost of health insurance.

So how can mid-sized employers change what they are doing?  They can form what is called a captive program.  A captive can be formed by a group of employers in an effort to reduce the costs associated with providing health benefits to their employees.  These employers can come from a wide variety of backgrounds including existing risk retention groups, trade associations, franchises, portfolio companion of private equity firms, and clients of an agency or broker.  Employers have been using captive programs for workers compensation for years with high success.

They are a tool to help employers gain more control over their health insurance and reduce its costs.  A captive program must be coupled with a long term commitment to reducing cost drivers.  Implementing wellness programs and medical tourism programs are ways to address cost control measures.


Read more @ http://www.selffundingmagazine.com/article-detail.php?issue=issue-5&article=captive-program

Modern Hospital Guangzhou China & Medical Tourism China

Modern Hospital Guangzhou possesses cancer treatment center, cosmetic & plastic surgery center, infertility treatment center, and hepatopathy center. The hospital is made up of a strong professional team of well-known experts, professors and returnee doctors, who are able to master the most advanced diagnostic and treatment methods for all medical tourism patients

Based on its five-star services, humanistic care and patient centeredness, Modern Hospital Guangzhou is one of the biggest hospitals in Guangdong Province that provides services for foreign patients who come from South Asia, Middle east, Africa, Europe and America and it is the first to advocate the green nursing care concept “one patient, one doctor and one nurse”.

Modern Hospital Guangzhou has set up clinical & medical departments of Cosmetic & Plastic Surgery, Gynecology, Andriatrics combined with Chinese and Western medicine, Oncology, Bone traumatology and orthopedics, Internal Medicine as well as paramedical units of medical imaging center and clinical laboratory center. Furthermore, Digital Cosmetic & Plastic Surgery, Gynecology, Andriatrics, Minimally invasive treatment for complicated malignant tumor and the stem cell transplantation have been developed as its well-known specialities

The Rising Popularity of Medical Tourism

Medical Tourism is the world used for international travelling patients to avail medical treatments abroad at affordable prices. This is fast becoming the accepted method of availing health care today. The rising costs of medical services and treatments in developed countries and tremendous waiting list can be seen as the obvious reasons for an enhanced state of health tourism in developing countries like India, Thailand, Mexico and Cost Rica.

There is lot of competitions among various nations to tap this industry to earn billions of revenue. In fact there are many valid reasons for the popularity of Medical Tourism like this.

World Class and Better Treatment: Medical Tourism gives you the alternates from selecting among an extensive range and method for the cure of your disease. You can evaluate the costs of the hospitals, medical centers and clinics in the different countries, calculate the travel expenditures and then take a decision what is best suited for you.

Cheap and Affordable: If you believe that traveling overseas would be more costly, and then check again. For the treatments of deadly and complex diseases, which require complicated surgeries, the costs are more in USA or Canada, whereas same treatment cost half in countries like India or Mexico, and that too includes the travelling and other expenditure. This is the reason why medical tourists compare the charge in all the leading international hospitals of the world

Medical Vacation and Travels: The best and the perhaps most appealing point of Medical Tourism is the fact that you get to travel and heal in relaxed ambiance. You can spend the free time relaxing and enjoying yourself after your treatment.

The Rising Popularity of Medical Tourism

Medical Tourism is the world used for international travelling patients to avail medical treatments abroad at affordable prices. This is fast becoming the accepted method of availing health care today. The rising costs of medical services and treatments in developed countries and tremendous waiting list can be seen as the obvious reasons for an enhanced state of health tourism in developing countries like India, Thailand, Mexico and Cost Rica.

There is lot of competitions among various nations to tap this industry to earn billions of revenue. In fact there are many valid reasons for the popularity of Medical Tourism like this.

World Class and Better Treatment: Medical Tourism gives you the alternates from selecting among an extensive range and method for the cure of your disease. You can evaluate the costs of the hospitals, medical centers and clinics in the different countries, calculate the travel expenditures and then take a decision what is best suited for you.

Cheap and Affordable: If you believe that travelling overseas would be more costly, and then check again. For the treatments of deadly and complex diseases, which require complicated surgeries, the costs are more in USA or Canada, whereas same treatment cost half in countries like India or Mexico, and that too includes the travelling and other expenditure. This is the reason why medical tourists compare the charge in all the leading international hospitals of the world

Medical Vacation and Travels: The best and the perhaps most appealing point of Medical Tourism is the fact that you get to travel and heal in relaxed ambiance. You can spend the free time relaxing and enjoying yourself after your treatment.