TL and Medical Tourism

[swordtart]

Originally Posted by ravenfish

Does the phenomenon of people traveling from a developed to a less developed country in search of cheaper health care occur in countries other than the United States?

We chose to have specialist treatment done privately in Germany rather than the UK for a number of reasons.

The UK National Health System (NHS) though excellent value for routine medical care(IMHO) isn't really suited to unusual medical conditions, due to resource constraints (they can't afford to have a specialist in obscure medical conditions on stand-by just in case). As a result specialist treatment is available state-paid but there are often long waiting lists. Alternatively you can pay to have it done privately within a much reduced time-frame. Once you have decided to go private you may as well shop around.

Germany had a world renowned specialist and whilst there were some specialists in the UK, they didn't have the same international reputation. The best in the world has to live somewhere, why wouldn't you travel to the best in the world (or galaxy) if you could afford it.

As someone else pointed out, it is not just the treatment, there is also recovery to consider. In our case the total cost of the treatment plus a few days locally in a hotel so that daily monitoring could occur was less in Germany than London. Favourable exchange rates and the fact that you can find European hotels that are less expensive than London hotels meant we could spend a long weekend in Hamburg for the price of 2 nights in London and could therefore have a few days decompressing. For me as a Brit, a few days in Hamburg is more fun than a few days in London anyway. There was the psychological benefit of thinking of the trip as a "holiday" to Hamburg plus some treatment compared to thinking of it as going to London for treatment.

Our one experience of a German hospital was that it seemed to be better equipped, maintained and run than the UK hospitals we have been to in the past. It should be remembered however that this was a private hospital and we have only been in NHS hospitals (and you only tend to dwell on the bad things about hospitals). A positive medical experience (in terms of feelings rather than any treatment) can generate psychological (placebo) recovery benefits.