More medical tourism

I’ve written about medical tourism before, and the topic seems to receiving increased attention these days. There was an article about it in the NY Times Sunday travel section. In the story, Joshua Kurlantzick discussed his experiences with medical care in Thailand.

Finishing my lunch at an open-air restaurant in downtown Bangkok, I felt slightly queasy. But by the time the taxi arrived back at my hotel, sweat was pouring out of my armpits, the folds of my stomach, even my shins, and my leg joints buckled as if a diamond-tipped drill was boring into them. As I got out of the taxi, I collapsed onto the street.

The taxi driver shoved me back into his cab, and we wove our way through the city’s infamous traffic to Bumrungrad International, a hospital near my hotel. I barely made it to the emergency room before I passed out. When I woke and remembered what had happened, part of me wanted to bolt from my E.R. bed. I knew very little about Thai medical facilities, and recalled a clinic I’d seen in neighboring Myanmar, where patients had to bring their own linens, needles and even bandages to the hospital.

Yet my Bumrungrad doctor, trained in America, immediately put me at ease. Surrounded by a gaggle of nurses ready to care for my every complaint at any time of day, the doctor informed me, “We’re pretty sure you have dengue fever,” referring to a dangerous tropical disease also known as breakbone fever…While I rested in a spotless room, he designed a program for my recovery, recommended a week of convalescence, and prescribed an array of medication for the searing joint pain.

When I visited Bumrungrad’s cashier, passing the hospital’s high-end restaurants and plush waiting rooms along the way, an assistant handed me the bill. For admittance to the emergency room, a consultation, a room and bags of medications, the total cost came to less than $100.

The increased level of’ medical care in places like Thailand now has some Americans looking abroad for both major and minor health procedures.

My unscheduled visit to Bumrungrad taught me an old lesson - and a new one. For decades, Americans have known they could obtain cheaper health care abroad, and have slipped off to Mexico for small surgeries or Canada for prescription drugs. But more and more people now recognize foreign hospitals can deliver not only cheap but also high-quality health care, and are considering medical tourism even for serious health problems…

Already, more than 150,000 people travel abroad each year for health care. According to Patients Without Borders: Everybody’s Guide to Affordable, World-Class Medical Tourism, a new book by Josef Woodman, overseas care can trim 60 to 80 percent, or more, off the price of major surgeries. Its comparison, for example, shows that a heart bypass in India costs one-thirteenth the price in America, and many foreign hospitals also offer postoperative care that includes a high degree of attention from hospital staff members.

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