Travelling to foreign countries for better medical care is a very common practice. It mostly involves patients from least developed countries to the developed nations such as the United States. The practice is common among those who can afford the high medical and travel expenses. For the poor patients who require specialized medical care, they are known to solicit funds for the same to see to it that they are treated.
However, there is another category of patients who are known to travel abroad with an aim of seeking medical health. Most of these people come from the developed countries and go to developing countries to seek their medical attention. Quite contradicting, right? The practice is known as medical tourism. Here is the big question, why would one move from a well-developed nation where medical services are of high quality and move to a developing country for the same?
There are several things that bring about this practice:
Cheaper services
There are several qualified doctors who study in developed nations such as the USA but they end up practicing in the developing nations. In most cases, the medical fees in these developing countries are generally lower as compared to the other nations. Therefore, a patient in the developed nation reasons, why pay more for a service they can get cheaply elsewhere? There are some diseases whose treatment is quite expensive in some nations such as the USA. For instance, dental diseases and conditions cost a fortune to be treated in United States, while crossing the border to Mexico; one would end up paying just a small amount of what they would have paid. Therefore, many medical tourists are trying to avoid the high medical costs in their own home countries.
To avoid long medical processes
Some medical attention requires a lot of close scrutiny and a lot of paper work before they are permitted. Medical health prioritizes human life safety hence some of the long protocols. However, some people opt to become medical tourists in other countries where they can get what they require without all the long processes. Sex change for instance, requires one to undergo through a long process before being permitted in US. However, moving to Thailand, this is not only done immediately, but the costs are also cheap by far.
Lenient regulations on safety
There are some surgeries that some developed countries may prohibit and control very tightly due to the health implications associated with them. Surgeries related to body parts’ enlargements for instance may take you some time to have them done in USA. In Brazil, breast enlargements are done so fast and cheaply. The insurance company may also contribute to medical tourism because they sometimes put a limit to what their medical covers can and cannot do. They do this considering the medical health of their clients and also because they may not want to be associated with the unauthorized medical practices.
Medical tourism provided for by companies like Satori World Medical owned by Steven Lash can help the government save money. If you sum up the travel expenses such as airfare and meals of public employees to travel abroad to avail medical services, it can still be significantly cheaper compared to allowing them to get procedures done domestically.
