Abstract
Medical tourism is a general term that describes patients traveling to obtain health services. The growth of medical tourism is due to a broad range of motivators and increasingly, developing countries are seeking to capitalize on these flows and are linking medical care with actual tourist activities. This commercial linkage between healthcare and tourism is a rapidly developing and profitable industry that is attracting growing interest amongst health researchers. This article summarizes seven leading issues concerning medically-motivated travel that were identified by academic researchers during a November 2009 Symposium on the Implications of Medical Tourism for Canadian Health and Health Policy. These issues include emerging technologies, particular vulnerable populations, Canadian business ties to the industry, patient populations excluded from analysis, and comparative analyses between health service providers for medical travelers. This article aims to help guide researchers as they investigate ethical, legal, social, public health, and economic issues related to the growing medical tourism industry.
Highlights
In November 2009, the University of Ottawa Globalization and Health Equity Research Unit held the Symposium on the Implications of Medical Tourism for Canadian Health and Health Policy ("Symposium on the Implications of Medical Tourism for Canadian Health and Health Policy," 2009), sponsored by the Institute of Health Services and Policy Research (IHSPR) of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR)
While this study focused on fertility clinics in Argentina, it is important to note that heterogeneity in health service providers is a growing phenomenon in medical tourism around the globe (i.e., increasing—but not ubiquitous—government certification of private hospitals in India and Thailand that meet international medical standards of quality and safety (Marlowe & Sullivan, 2007))
This article represents a collection of expert opinions by academic researchers from diverse disciplines, the goal of which was the identification of important knowledge gaps, current challenges, and strategic areas for future research into medical tourism and its relationship with Canadian health policy
Summary
Numerous topics and issues concerning medical tourism and Canadian health policy were identified in the course of the Symposium, discussions which considered broad overviews, focused studies, summaries of ongoing research projects, and case studies concerning medical tourism (Note 2). At the end of the Symposium, a plenary discussion explored the current challenges and knowledge gaps pertaining to medical tourism, as well as tentative strategies on how best to advance research initiatives and investigate this emerging industry. While this article does not present empirical findings from a specific research initiative, it does synthesize existing knowledge and identify gaps in scholarship, which the authors believe could serve as a guide for Canadian researchers in conducting their own independent investigations into the medical tourism industry. Wealthy individuals from developing nations have tended to seek care in North American and Western European nations, but this pattern is shifting to other developing countries (Kangas, 2007; Lautier, 2008), notably the United Arab Emirates, Jordan, Thailand, Singapore, and Tunisia, nations with increasingly sophisticated medical infrastructure and lower comparable costs in healthcare
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