Saturday, August 11, 2007

Steve Forbes on Open Heart Surgery at 90% discount

In the latest issue of Forbes, August 13, 2007, Steve Forbes has picked up on similar thoughts about using the phenomenon of "medical tourism" to mitigate America's healthcare problems.

Highly recommended commentary from Steve Forbes is available in the latest issue of Forbes and at Forbes.com. Some of the highlights are:

-- Medical tourism will be a $40 billion industry by 2010.
-- Increasing number of Americans are going abroad for elective and/or major surgeries.
-- India, Thailand and Singapore are major destinations.
-- Overseas hospitals dont have to deal with US regulations and red tape and can start fresh without the high administrative costs (think of the proverbial $60 asprin story!!)
-- Expat doctors trained in the US are going back to their birth countries (mostly India!) since they now have a change to work in world class facilities and at the same time give back to their country of origin.
-- Internations accreditation agencies like JCI are helping provide a level field of quality.

For more details on accreditation (what JCI is all about) and what issues one must consider before going overseas and specifically to India, visit http://www.medical-treatment-in-india.com/ and feel free to post your comments on this blog.

To quote Steve Forbes from his artcle:
"Medical tourism is an exciting glimpse at the huge savings, productivity gains and medical advances that could be had if we got genuine consumer-controlled health care here--as well as overseas."

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