THIS WEEK IN MEDICAL TRAVEL TODAY
Volume 4, Issue 15

by Amanda Haar, Editor

Greetings,

To stay or to go? That appears to be the question of the hour for U.S. patients, providers, and businesses.
 
Under this week's INDUSTRY NEWS we have stories from six major print and online sources including USAToday, Crain's, The Denver Business Journal and fiercehealth.com, each examining how U.S.-based businesses and health care providers are attempting to provide care for consumers on American soil. Along with media attention, the domestic push is capturing the interest of large employer groups who continue to look for ways to control costs and ensure quality of care.
 
But not everyone's convinced. C. Philip Slaton, president of The Icon Group (see INDUSTRY NEWS), recently expanded his business to include the export of U.S. board-certified physicians and surgeons and their U.S. patients to destinations outside the U.S.
 
What do you think? We invite you to share your thoughts on this topic as well as any other story ideas and press releases you might have.

Cheers,

Amanda Haar, Editor
ahaar@cpronline.com

SPECIAL NOTE: A new interview featuring Medical Travel Today Publisher Laura Carabello has just been posted on the Raw Bar, the podcast section of the The Employee Benefits Advisor website. Click here to hear her thoughts on how the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act is likely to influence U.S. consumers decisions to travel abroad for care.

SPOTLIGHT: Richard Baker, founder and president, North American Surgery

Richard Baker, founder and president, North American Surgery

Editor's Note: Rick Baker is a medical services entrepreneur who founded Timely Medical Alternatives in 2003 to assist Canadians on long medical waiting lists to obtain timely surgeries at centers of surgical excellence in the U.S. at deeply discounted prices.  In 2005, Baker expanded his services to cover uninsured American citizens, and founded North American Surgery.  In the past seven years he has been helping Canadians and uninsured Americans, and reports that his two companies have saved the lives of seven clients, including an 8-year-old girl with a massive cranial infection.

Baker's companies have received significant publicity:  Los Angeles Times, Washington Post, Wall St. Journal, Smart Money Magazine, US News & World Report, Kiplinger Personal Finance, ABC Television program “20/20” (twice), NPR Radio, Fox Television program “Fox & Friends.”

In July 2009, Baker gave testimony in the U.S. Capitol building in Washington, D.C.  The event, sponsored by Rep. Eric Cantor, was a Republican Health Care investigative committee.  Baker was quoted as saying that the Canada Health Act, which regulates the delivery of socialized healthcare in that country, is responsible for more pain, suffering, and death than any other piece of domestic legislation in Canadian History.

Medical Travel Today (MTT):  Give us a brief overview of your company and how you got involved in this business.

Rick Baker (RB):  I am the president and founder of North American Surgery, which we founded in 2005 to help uninsured Americans gain timely access to reasonably priced quality surgery. I’m in Vancouver, Canada, but we help clients all over North America from Northern Canada right down to Florida and Hawaii. 

 I’ve always been an entrepreneur, had sold a previous business, and was sort of at loose ends.  My wife teaches medical courses to doctors, including advanced cardiac life support and cardiac arrhythmia interpretation.  She was putting on a course up in rural British Columbia, and I went along with her on one occasion – primarily because I wanted to see that part of the country and the doctors had a little reception to thank her for coming up and teaching.  

I was chatting with one physician who had a client or a patient who was 85 and was on a 12-week wait to see an urologist.  The patient had raging kidney stones, a very debilitating, very painful condition.  And I thought, “Twelve weeks?”  Now, I’m not a doctor and I’m not a politician, but I’m sure I can do better than that.  I could arrange some format, some facility nearby where the Canadians could get quicker access to healthcare.  And that was back in 2003.  After that, we were off and running with our Canadian company which is called Timely Medical Alternatives. 

One day, I got a call from a woman in Wisconsin who needed a new hip, and we sent her to one of the facilities that we had negotiated good prices.  She was on her way to India, already arranging to buy a ticket to India when she saw our Canadian website.  She called me, and to make a long story short, she got her hip replacement in upstate Michigan. 
She said, “You know it costs a couple of thousand dollars more than going to India, but why would I go to India to save a couple of thousand dollars?”   She was very happy, and I thought, “If that woman who is uninsured needed our help, I bet there’s lots of others."
And I came to find out that there are somewhere between 30 and 49 million uninsured Americans, and we formed the new company.  We haven’t looked back. 

MTT:And do you foresee that there will be more uninsured after healthcare reform?

RB:  Probably. My personal belief is that the Obama care will never actually come to pass.  I don’t think that the Republicans would have the courage to squash it or repeal it, but I think just failing to fund it would lead to a slow and natural death.  We’re hearing all sorts of things in the aftermath of the passages of the bill that are not looking positive, such as the Mayo Clinic shutting down in Phoenix because they foresee the drop in Medicare payments, which will leave them unable to make a profit.  It’s not looking good at all. However, I’m doing my part. 

MTT:Tell me a little bit about your perspectives on travel to the United States versus traveling to any other part of the world.

RB:  We have a business model whereby we send people within North America.  Under rare circumstances would we consider sending them abroad.  We had a client with cysts all over his kidneys, some type of polycystic disease.  We do have a connection in the Philippines where they have been doing stem cell research and treatment for many, many years.  
They started it far sooner than anybody started it in the U.S., and we attempted to send our client to the Philippines, and it was a nightmare of communication problems. We’d send e-mails off, we wouldn’t get an answer for ten days.  I mean, e-mails are instant. You would think you would get an instant reply as we do within North America.  It just went on and on and on, and we threw up our hands. 

So that’s the only time we ever tried to send anyone abroad.  We have other issues with medical tourism, outside of the country.  Take India.  First of all there’s political unrest. Then there’s the issue in Mumbai: Remember just a year ago when there were stories of the Pakistani terrorists walking through hospitals with AK47s seeking out Western-looking patients?  You don’t get that in Oklahoma City or Phoenix.

There is also the issue about bringing back bacteria or parasitic infections from subtropical countries.  These issues are not seen over here – we don’t see the same parasites in North America so they are difficult to diagnose, difficult to treat. 

I say to people, “What about if you need a blood transfusion, are you totally confident in the security of the source of the blood you might be getting for a transfusion?”  I mean the hospitals may be excellent, I grant them that they have fine hospitals and excellent doctors, but what about the blood? What about if you come home with a subtropical infection? What if the surgery goes south, and they want to take legal action, how do you file a malpractice suit in India?  What if you get an embolism, a pulmonary embolism on the plane home from India? The Mayo Clinic came up with a report that if you fly more than 5,000 kilometers pre- or post-surgery when you’re in a compromised medical condition, your chance of getting a pulmonary embolism increases 30 percent.  If you get a pulmonary embolism on an airplane they take you out in a body bag when that plane lands.  You simply don’t survive. It’s hard enough to survive in the hospital, let alone in an airplane. So for these and other reasons, we just don’t believe in sending people abroad.

I mean, people used to go to Bumrungrad in Thailand.  Well, Thailand is a war zone right now, and you might have gone innocently enough to that country, and suddenly a war breaks out.  And I don’t mean to be an alarmist, but you don’t have wars in the U.S, you don’t have parasites, you don’t have terrorists to any major degree.  There’s an established legal system and procedure for filing malpractice suits. Blood supplies are secure and trustworthy.  So, that’s why we don’t send people off shore. 

MTT:Do you perceive any barriers to the adoption of domestic, intra-U.S. medical travel?  Are there any specific challenges for employers sending their employees or consumers themselves?

RB:  Our model is direct-to-patient.  I have tried over the years to deal with insurance companies.  My suppliers, of whom there are 22 in our network, have cautioned me not to reveal that they are in our network if I’m talking to any insurance company.  The reason: They give me better prices than they give insurance companies. 
One of our hospitals does a lot of hip and knee replacements. Their charge to me for a hip is $14,000.  Their charge to an insurance company is $24,000.  So if I start bringing in the insurance companies, the whole scheme collapses because the insurance companies will then go to our suppliers and say, well, we want those same prices.  If you’re giving them to Rick Baker, why can’t you give them to us?

So, we can’t work with insurance companies.  Then we thought we’d work with self-insured employers, and I flew to Orlando and talked to a chain of five hotels with 5,000 employees.  They were quite positive and supposedly excited about the concept.  But what they ran into was this:  By the time the coordinator of their program heard that one of the employees had an issue, say it was a cardiac or spinal issue, they would’ve gone to a hospital and gotten the process underway to get their care.  And they found it very difficult to then pull the plug on that work-up, and say, “No, no, no you can’t go to this hospital, we’ve got a much better hospital in Wichita, Kansas.”

 Then they found their employees were looking at traveling across the country, when they would prefer to stay right in their own neighborhood. They said, “Look, you’ve agreed to insure us, and we don’t want to go to Kansas, or Arizona, or Oklahoma.  We want to have it right here.”  Then they’d say, “We’ll wave your deductible,” to which they’d respond, “We don’t care.  We’re prepared to pay the deductible and stay right in our own backyard.”

So, it never got anywhere. I think that is the reason Healthplace America went out of business.  They started another service trying to triage people to foreign countries. That didn’t work either.  So they regrouped, and they reinvented themselves as a company that triages employees of self-insuring employers. It was a large company with an infinite number of vice presidents and medical advisors.  Their roster included over 60 contact names.  They folded, couldn’t make a dime.  In the first year of their existence, they never triaged one single client for medical care – even with all sorts of websites, literature, executives, and corporate offices.  They never triaged one patient.  In that same year, we probably triaged 100 to 150 people.  It’s increasing now.

MTT:So what is your formula for success?

RB:  It’s not because we’re any better at what we do.  We’ve always thought we’ve done a pretty good job, but the difference is that we have optimized our website.  We hired a firm to optimize it, and we’re getting more and more hits on our website everyday because of that optimization.  It’s funny -- you can do the best job in the world, but if people don’t know about you, you’re not going to succeed.  So we set about making sure that people know about us.

MTT:Tell me in a few words, what is your outlook for the industry?
RB:  I continue to be optimistic.  In a market of 30 million people who are uninsured, and even if Obama is going to try to make sure that everybody is insured, I wonder if that will happen.  My belief is that people will opt to pay the fines and drop coverage — the fines are a fraction of the cost of the insurance.  

When people discover that they need surgery, they’ll go back to Mr. Obama and say, “Look, you said that people can’t turn us down for preexisting conditions.  So here we are, we need a heart bypass.”
It’s just not workable. 

MTT:So your outlook then is a bright future for the medical travel industry as a whole?

RB:  I think so.  The industry has been characterized by hospitals having a catchment area from where their patients emanate. A few hospitals, like Cleveland Clinic or Mayo Clinic, draw people from a distance, but at an enormous cost and not many who can afford to go.

By the way, I just heard recently that Mayo is shutting down.  But when they were up and running, their rating on healthgrades.com for knee replacement surgery was a one star.  It should be noted that we send people to facilities with three or even five-star ratings. Our clients pay about $18,000 for a knee replacement while Mayo charges were around $85,000.  Now, why would you pay $85,000 for a knee operation at a one-star facility when you can pay $18,000 and get a five-star hospital?

MTT:Do you have any specific examples?

LB:  Absolutely.  One of our clients, a chiropractor from San Francisco, was featured in a story in Kiplinger’s Personal Finance. He needed to have a carotid artery procedure, and he was looking to go to India.  First he went to his local hospital where facility fees would be $80,000, not including any professional component (doctor or anesthesiologist).  So he was facing $90,000 to $100,000 in expenses, and was quite discouraged. 

Many sole proprietor professionals, such as this chiropractor, do not have adequate insurance.  When this gentleman looked into having surgery in India, he realized the whole thing including travel was going to cost him just $13,000 – and he brightened up considerably.  And just as a final thought, he called my company. 

To make a long story short, he got his procedure in Oklahoma City for $15,400 -- $2,400 more than in India.  He thought it “idiotic” to fly to India to save $2,400.  If he stayed in the country, he could make up that $2,400 in a few days.  It made no sense whatsoever to go to India when he could stay in the U.S. and have the security of knowing he was in his own country. 

MTT:But do you think some people are intrigued with the idea of “seeing the world?”

RB:  That’s medical tourism for those who want a cosmetic medical procedure, which is not life threatening or causing them any distress.  They just want to do it for lifestyle reasons. And they reason that since they are getting this procedure for other than purely medical reasons, they might as well combine it with a trip to India and see the country. 

That’s fair enough, and I don’t have any argument with people who do that. Our company doesn’t facilitate cosmetic surgery.   The principal reason is we’ve been told -- and I can see it -- these types of clients are seldom satisfied with the results they achieve.  They always want something better.  I look at that actress Heidi Montague or Joan Rivers who keep going back for more and more and more.  They’re high maintenance, and we just chose not to get involved with cosmetic surgery.

Nor will we facilitate gastric bypass.  It’s a very risky surgery.  I mean going to India for gastric bypass is really a crazy idea.  This procedure is best done in your own hometown. We will facilitate a lap band or a gastric sleeve, but not a gastric bypass.  If you’re a thousand miles from home and you have a complication, it could just be a horrible experience and I prefer not to get involved with that.  In my opinion, it’s ill-advised to go to India, Central America, or Asia for gastric bypass – but it’s a free world and they’re free to do so.  Everybody makes their own decisions.

INDUSTRY NEWS

Domestic medical travel could ratchet up pressure on local providers

Fiercehealthcare.com — If domestic medical travel takes off, your biggest competitor might be a hospital hundreds of miles away that offers better quality and less expensive care. Healthcare dollars may be headed out of town, but not necessarily overseas, as some employers encourage workers to consider "domestic medical travel" to keep costs down, according to a report by Kaiser Health News.

Domestic medical travel could shake up the hospital industry by fostering truly national competition, consultant Jim Unland of the Health Capital Group in Chicago told KHN.

To read more, click here.

Cleveland Clinic proves a hotspot destination for 'domestic medical travel'

Crainscleveland.com — More employers and insurers are offering financial incentives to encourage workers to consider "domestic medical travel" to places — including Cleveland — where better-quality, less-expensive care can be found, according to this story from Kaiser Health News and USA Today.

“By steering workers to facilities with high-quality care and lower prices, employers say they can reduce their costs 20% to 40% — more than enough to cover the travel expenses,” according to Kaiser and theUSA Today report.
To read more, click here.

Company cuts medical costs by sending patients to U.S. hospitals, not overseas

Denver Business Journal — Vic Lazzaro is CEO of BridgeHealth International Inc., which is focused on reducing medical costs by using hospitals nationwide.

BridgeHealth International Inc. thinks it has a better prescription for medical patients, one that will lower health care costs: Instead of traveling overseas to save money on certain surgeries, stay home and do the same.

To read more, click here.

More employers pushing domestic medical tourism

More employers pushing domestic medical tourism: In yet another effort to slow the inexorable rise of health care costs in the U.S., more employers are turning to domestic medical tourism.

To read more, click here.

Domestic medical travel is taking off for surgery deals

USAToday — When John McNally needed a knee-replacement operation, his employer, Alpha Coal West, offered to pay his travel expenses if he would have the surgery in Fort Collins, Colo., a five-hour drive from his home near Gillette, Wyo.

To read more, click here.

Escape FROM America – U.S. Doctors Head Overseas

Seattle, WA — C. Philip Slaton, president of The Icon Group, LLC announced that its domestic U.S. Board-certified physicians and surgeons recruiting business, has been expanded to include the exporting of U.S. Board-certified physicians and surgeons to medical tourism countries.  This new business activity is branded “Escape from America.”   The branding relates to the fact that studies, and Slaton’s investigations, have shown that many U.S. Board-certified physicians and surgeons are, for various reasons, dissatisfied with the U.S. healthcare system. 

From his experience in producing the world’s only business-to-consumer Medical Tourism Expos in the United States, Slaton believes that the shortfall of medical tourism hospitals and hospital development companies to attract greater numbers of American medical tourists is due in part to the reality that U.S. Board-certified physicians and surgeons from America are not currently working in large numbers in the international medical tourism industry.  Slaton believes that with U.S. Board-certified physicians andsurgeons bringing their American patients, and resulting development of new American patients to the various medical tourism countries, that medical tourism would increase tenfold.

U.S. Board-certified physicians and surgeons bringing their own American patients to medical tourism destinations, and developing new medical tourism clients, would NOT adversely impact existing in-country medical tourism U.S. Board-certified physicians and surgeons.  To the contrary, Slaton foresees that a country’s medical tourism program would improve for all practitioners by the inclusion of U.S. Board-certified physicians and surgeons.  

So far the two models or options that have emerged for the deployment of U.S. Board-certified physicians and surgeons in medical tourism countries are:

1. Starting their own parallel practice in a foreign country and bringing in their U.S. patients for surgical procedures, as well as developing new medical tourism patients.
2. Joining a practice, clinic, or hospital and bringing their own patients, as well as developing new medical tourism patients.

There are currently 35 countries that cater to medical tourists. Slaton sees that infusing the medical tourism hospitals in these countries with U.S. Board-certified physicians and surgeons will help improve the medical tourism and local healthcare system delivery models in those countries.

Further information is available from:

C. Philip Slaton and The Icon Group
2916 NW Bucklin Hill Road, # 178
Silverdale, WA USA 98383
Telephone (001) (360) 697-7880.    
Email: Icon@iconnetwork.org.

Florida-based Facilitator Sues Former Senior Executive

Worldwide Medical Partners (WMP; http://www.wmpmedical.com/), a medical tourism facilitator in Florida, has filed a temporary injunction against a suspended staff member, Veselin Gitchev, in the Florida courts.Gitchev, formerly an executive director of WMP is alleged to have diverted business and revenue away from his employer to a side company he created in Canada.  It is alleged that Gitchev diverted funds from his employer and is also involved with the creation of a for-profit association in medical tourism with several other individuals in the medical tourism industry. This new association is called Coalition for International Patient Advocacy (CIPA).  Now WMP has filed an injunction against Gitchev and is suing him for damages. The injunction in this legal action is also against the newly formed CIPA.  This new association is specifically a for-profit owned by several shareholders including Gitchev for diverting funds from his company.
 
Gitchev has been ordered to return to WMP its notebook computer and portable electronic storage devise, which contains confidential information about medical providers, insurers, and hospital vendors. Gitchev has also been ordered to stop using WMPs contacts with Teva Pharmaceuticals, Pfizer, and Novartis as it is in violation of the non-competition clause in his employment agreement. The order goes on to terminate “all efforts and work-related efforts to divert actually or prospective relationships, opportunities and assets from WMP to access, defendant Coalition for International Patient Advocacy (CIPA).”  The injunction is to protect trade secrets, assets, and opportunities misappropriated by its executive director (Vitchev) in violation of the express terms of his employment.

Patients Beyond Borders®FOCUS ON series to feature top Malaysian hospitals
Official pre-launch set for APHM international medical tourism conference in July

Chapel Hill, NC – 8 July 2010:Patients Beyond Borders,the best-selling consumer reference guide for medical tourism, is pleased to announce the release of four new FOCUS ON editions profiling Malaysia’s leading private healthcare facilities. FOCUS ON: KPJ Ampang Puteri Specialist Hospital, FOCUS ON: KPJ Damansara Specialist Hospital, FOCUS ON: Prince Court Medical Center, and FOCUS ON: Sime Darby Medical Center Subang Jaya will be featured in these new digital publications, highlighting their many services and specialties.

The announcement comes as the Association of Private Hospitals of Malaysia (APHM) is scheduled to host its Annual International Healthcare Conference and Exhibition July 13 – 15, 2010, in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Now in its eighteenth year, the conference features dignitaries and notable speakers from Malaysia and throughout the world. The theme for this year’s conference is “3G’s in Hospital Management – Governance, Giving and Greening.”

“We are excited to be participating in this dynamic new program,” says Dato Dr. Jacob Thomas, president of APHM. “The FOCUS ON: format will allow us to creatively promote Malaysia to the international traveler with up-to-date, interactive information on Malaysia’s signature medical specialties, pricing, and advantages as a leading international medical travel destination.”

Healthy Travel Media’s new FOCUS ON: series offers a 30-page, full-color digital brochure and eBook highlighting the world’s leading internationally accredited hospitals and specialty centers in a fully searchable and dynamic consumer-friendly format. Published under the Patients Beyond Borders brand, the series offers healthcare consumers detailed information on specialties, procedures, costs, and travel planning from the most recognized, trusted information source in international medical travel.

“We’re honored to be showcasing so many of Malaysia’s top hospitals in our new series,” says Josef Woodman, president of Healthy Travel Media. “Malaysia has quickly risen to become one of the world’s leading international medical travel destinations with its state-of-the art facilities and competitive pricing.”

“The opportunity to showcase our hospitals and provide information on specific procedures, providers, packages, and pricing to healthcare consumers will greatly enhance our ability to reach the international patient at or near the decision stage of health procedure planning,” says Dato Dr. Thomas.

The FOCUS ON: series is  accessible from a variety of sources, including the Patients Beyond Borderswebsite, each facility’s website, third-party websites, Kindle, and other eBook readers, iPhone, and other mobile devices, medical, business, and reference libraries worldwide, and all popular social networks.

           
U.S. Clinic Sending Surgery Patients to Yucatan via American Medical Facilitators

Online PR News - Medical Traveler Yucatan (MTY), a team of American and Canadian medical tourism facilitators, has forged a new alliance with a Utah clinic network. MediCruiser Family Practice, of Salt Lake City, will begin referring U.S. patients to MTY for surgery in Merida, Yucatan. The partnership was begun in response to the large number of under-insured and uninsured Americans seeking needed surgery or elective procedures but who are unable to afford it. www.medicaltraveleryucatan.com

Merida resident and American Alan Graham, the founder and director of MTY and former non-profit executive, states, “It just doesn’t make good sense, health-wise and money-wise, for patients to be deprived of a new heart valve or shoulder surgery. Or pay two to four times what they should for gastric bypass surgery or a face-lift or even dental implants when Merida is less than a two-hour flight from Houston.”

Paul Gahlinger, M.D., CEO of MediCruiser and University of Utah School of Medicine physician, agrees. “The solution is services like MTY -- high quality, respectable, and reliable.”

MTY matches medical travelers with board-certified, English-speaking surgeons who have had training, continuing education, or affiliations in the United States. MTY conducts consumer evaluations of the selected hospital to insure superior medical care for patients.
Patients traveling to Merida for medical care through MTY can expect substantial savings of 35 - 75 percent. Medical travelers discover that they are informed of hospital and surgery costs before they decide on their surgical trip. Since the American-Canadian MTY team is located in Merida, the company has the advantage of maintaining personal contact with hospital administrators and individual doctors.

“Here in Merida our close relationships allow us to be effective in negotiating the very best surgery and hospital fees for our patients – without sacrificing the highest level of medical quality,”says  Graham.

Besides authoring a series of articles on medical tourism, Graham received all of his medical and dental care in Merida, Yucatan - including major surgery – for the last five years.

Made up of an American-Canadian team living and working in Merida - near Cancun –MTY provides all-inclusive coordination of medical procedures and medical tourism trip services. Surgery is scheduled in a timely fashion at a world-class hospital and at substantial savings. The MTY team coordinates and oversees all hospital and medical surgery trip details in person. Unique in its approach, the U.S.-Canadian team meets patients at the airport and accompanies them throughout their medical stay.

MTY is partnered with Merida’s Star Medica Hospital, a new state-of-the-art, pristine, high-tech facility. It is the number one choice for thousands of Canadians and Americans who live in Merida. Star Medica is a current applicant for the prestigious Joint Commission International accreditation.

Medical tourism is growing by more than 30 percent each year. By 2015 it is estimated that between 10 and 20 million Americans and Canadians will travel outside of their country for medical care.

MTY team members make all medical arrangements in-person. Patients can expect their experience in cosmetic, bariatric procedures, orthopedic, oncology, cardiovascular, fertility, vision, or dental procedures to be equal to – and usually better than at home. And MTY also coordinates non-medical arrangements including transportation, hotel, patient monitoring, communication with patient’s family, and meeting special needs. Patients are met at the airport by their countrymen who accompany them throughout their medical stay.
As for safety, patients can be reassured that Merida, with a metropolitan area of just over a million (including the nearly 10,000 Americans and Canadians who live in Merida and the state of Yucatan), enjoys a reputation for being a very safe city. Merida’s distinct geographic advantage – far away from the violence of other North American cities - contributes to its standing as a city where you can still stroll the streets at night.

MTY is located in Merida, Yucatan, near Cancun and is a quick flight from most U.S. and Canadian cities. Quality care, substantial savings, safety, and easy access make medical trips to Merida a practical decision. This, combined with the fact that MTY’s U.S.- Canadian team is on-location at the patient’s destination, presents new options to Americans and Canadians seeking sound medical solutions.

Hospital Angeles Tijuana Announces Functional Oncology Treatment Medical Travel Program

PRWEB July 9, 2010 -- Hospital Angeles Tijuana, a popular “medicaltourism” destination for Americans and Canadians, offers cancer patients around the world an integrative approach to disease management with its Functional Oncology treatment program. Hospital Angeles Tijuana director Paulo Yberri describes the Angeles Functional Oncology treatment plan as “a more current approach to cancer treatment by integrating the best of what is available in oncological and integrative medicine.”

According to Yberri, the Angeles Functional Oncology treatment program is characterized by the concept of a more inclusive approach to the patient’s overall health and includes professionals in fields such as internal medicine, nutrition, chiropractic, biological dentistry, functional medicine, and psychology.

“The Angeles Functional Oncology treatment program is one of the most innovative, advanced integrative cancer treatment approaches available anywhere in the world, “ says Yberri. “Cancer patients treated at Hospital Angeles Tijuana will have the benefit of working with one of the most experienced functional medicine teams, at one of the most state-of-the-art hospitals in all of North America.”

The Functional Oncology treatment program at Hospital Angeles Tijuana is spearheaded by Ariel Perez, M.D. Dr. Perez has developed functional oncology programs for several Mexico-based hospital systems; he has received certification in functional medicine by the Institute for Functional Medicine.

In addition, Dr. Perez holds certification in bioenergetics by the Vega Academy Germany, hyperthermia by the Heckel Academy Germany, and medical ozone therapy by the Medical Society for Ozone.

“Our mission is to improve patient outcomes through prevention, early assessment and comprehensive management of complex, chronic disease by identifying and healing the underlying clinical imbalances of chronic disease and creating momentum towards health, “said Dr. Perez.

In the U.S., traditional cancer treatment generally includes surgery, radiation therapy, chemotherapy, hormone therapy, and biological therapy --  methods that are known to damage healthy cells and tissues with persistent, debilitating side effects.

As distinguished from traditional cancer treatments, the Angeles Functional Oncology treatment program focuses on cell biology and cell function, as well as environmental factor and immunotherapy. Throughout the three-week treatment program, patients will experience treatments specifically designed to target cancer cells while shielding healthy cells from collateral damage.

“The functional oncology program goes beyond conventional therapy by integrating functional tools for fighting cancer,” says Dr. Perez. “All patients begin the program with an Integrative multidisciplinary assessment. This is first and foremost a science-based medical treatment program, and many of our treatments - for example ozonized hyperthermia - require a hospital-controlled environment.”

The Functional Oncology treatment program plans average three weeks long; a five-day  program is also available.

About Hospital Angeles Tijuana
Hospital Angeles Tijuana is a state-of-the-art medical complex that is part of the largest private hospital network in Mexico. Located just minutes from downtown San Diego, Hospital Angeles Tijuana is a technologically innovative hospital with a patient-centric approach to care that has made it a premier destination for medical travelers, serving more than 7,000 patients from the U.S., Canada, and Europe in just the past few years. In 2009 Hospital Angeles launched Angeles Health International, an internal international patient program providing medical travel concierge services to U.S. patients.

The Angeles Functional Oncology treatment program provides all medical travelers with a personal case management team to provide patients with information about requested procedures, surgeons and specialists, medical records transfer, consults, procedure scheduling, financing, and payment options. Also included is a travel concierge to handle all patient and patient companion traveling plans.

Joint Commission International Announces Change in Leadership

The Joint Commission has announced that its long-time president and chief executive of Joint Commission Resources and Joint Commission International will be leaving the position on July 1, 2010.

Karen H. Timmons has headed up the organizations since 1999. Since that time Joint Commission International has developed a presence in 90 countries and currently accredits facilities in 41 countries.

Joint Commission International is also a part of the World Health Organization's Collaborating Centre for Patient Safety Solutions.

To read more, click here.

China’s Largest Private Healthcare Group Introduces Traditional Chinese Medicine for Medical Tourism

Guangzhou, China, July 12, 2010 — Boai Medical Group, China's largest private medical organization, has commenced international operations that will provide unique medical tourism services for international patients. The move allows for the Group’s specialist treatment modality of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) combined with Western medicine to be provided for a wider patient group. Modern Hospital Guangzhou - a flagship institution within the Boai Group – is spearheading the expansion and has recently appointed an international medical tourism consultancy firm to develop its marketing and improve its patient quality practices.

“TCM has long been established as a mainstream medical model throughout the whole of East Asia, but in the Western world, it is considered an alternative health system,” said Carlos Che, M.D., professor of Oncology at Modern Hospital Guangzhou. “What we offer is a treatment program that provides the best of both philosophies of care, as we have a wealth of clinical evidence that shows that TCM can enhance Western medicine. We are very much looking forward to bringing the benefits of this approach to patients in the Gulf region.” 

Modern Hospital Guangzhou is one of Boai Group’s 56 medical institutions in China and has pioneered combining modern medical techniques with traditional forms of treatment. The hospital has highly specialized centers to treat infertility, diabetes, and cardiovascular diseases, and is renowned for its advanced cancer treatments. Cancer, in its various forms, remains one of the most significant life-threatening conditions in human history, with the World Health Organization revealing that around 7.6 million people across the globe died of the disease in 2008 -- a figure that equates to almost 20,000 per day.

“The established Western techniques to treat cancer involve surgery, chemotherapy, and radiotherapy, but at Modern Hospital we utilize TCM to improve the efficacy of this treatment,” Dr. Che added.

Research appears to validate this particular treatment modality. In one study, Professor Lin Hongsheng, deputy director of the Chinese Journal Professional Association of Integrative Oncology, applied “Fuzheng Anti-cancer Prescription” in conjunction with Western medication for 56 patients with advanced gastric cancer post surgery. The patients were followed up for 12 years, with the results revealing that their five-year and 10-year survival rates were 30.36 percent and 12.5 percent respectively -- statistics that revealed that the approach was more successful than alternative treatment options. Similarly, Zhang Wen, M.D., from Shanghai Cancer Hospital, successfully applied the Chinese medicine Kanglaite by injection for liver cancer treatment. This increased the five-year survival rate for liver cancer patients by 15 percent.

Boai Group has recently appointed a leading medical tourism consultancy firm, ExHealth, to develop its practice within Medical Tourism Industry. ExHealth will be partnering with the Group to assist it with aspects relating to international patient practices and to identify new opportunities for them, as well as providing support on ethical, cultural, and legal issues. 

UPCOMING EVENTS

Medical Travel Meeting Brazil Scheduled for August 25-28, 2010

Joe Carabello, president and CEO of CPR Strategic Marketing Communications and publisher of Medical Travel Today, to address “Keys to Raising Awareness and Generating Consumer and Business Inquiries for Medical Travel to Brazil”

The medical travel industry is estimated to be worth $60 billion globally.
Aiming to encourage this new market in Brazil, the "Medical Meeting Travel Brazil" will take place August 25-28, 2010 at the Grand Hyatt Sao Paulo (SP). This is the first international event in the country that will generate business opportunities for healthcare operators, brokers and international facilitators, in addition to presenting the excellence of Brazilian medicine and its hospitals to the world. The meeting will feature national and international markets and the presence of the key players and buyers.
 
Joe Carabello, president and CEO of CPR Strategic Marketing Communications and publisher of Medical Travel Today (www.medicaltraveltoday.com) will address the subject of Marketing Communications and PR:  The Keys to Raising Awareness and Generating Consumer and Business Inquiries for Medical Travel to Brazil.
 
From social networking to media relations and email campaigns, getting the word out to prospective individual customers and business clients is essential. This presentation will provide guidelines for achieving media attention that drives interest – and business – to Brazil.

Attendees will learn:
- What works with U.S. editors – both consumer and business trade media
- “How To” - reach B2C and B2B editors and reporters - print, TV, and electronic
- How to target appropriate US geographical areas to generate optimal interest
- What to say and what not to say regarding Brazil
- How to launch an email campaign
- How to capitalize on the new social media opportunities

To register visit : http://www.medicaltravelmeetingbrazil.com

Twitter: http://twitter.com/mtmbrazil

Asian Countries Unite for Medical Tourism in IMWell Summit
With the Philippines spearheading the initiative for Asia to be a regional hub for health, wellness, and retirement, representatives of different Asian countries including India, Thailand, Malaysia, Korea, Taiwan, and Singapore are set to gather in the International Summit on Medical Travel, Wellness and Retirement (IMWell Summit) on October 12-15, 2010, at the Makati Shangri-La Hotel to discuss the most important issues in global health care.

A convergence of health care, hospitality, and travel industry leaders, the IMWell Summit is envisioned to be a forum for different countries to hold multilateral dialogues and discuss how they can cooperate for the region to further develop medical and wellness tourism.

“Without question, medical travel has significantly transformed the face of global health care,” says Undersecretary Cynthia Carrion, who heads the Department of Tourism’s Office for Sports and Wellness. “The pool of patients around the world seeking medical treatment abroad has grown, with increasing cost efficiency and adoption of advanced medical technology overseas. This presents a huge opportunity for us, and it is only fitting that the Philippines is hosting the IMWell Summit, as we have already proven our country to be an emerging powerhouse as a health and wellness destination.”

According to the Department of Tourism, the number of overseas patients and clients visiting the Philippines has rapidly increased from 60,000 foreign patients in 2007 to about 100,000 foreign patients in 2008 and gross revenues estimated to be at US$350mn since the program was launched in 2006. In light of this booming phenomenon, the Department of Tourism expects the Philippines to corner a total of US$3bn of the global medical tourism industry by 2015, with 200,000 foreign patients arriving annually.

“The IMWell Summit demonstrates that the Philippines is at the forefront of this ‘sunrise’ industry, which has been a key driver in our economic growth. As a pioneering initiative in the whole region, it also establishes our pro-active stance in cooperating with our neighboring countries and making them partners in medical tourism,” says Joyce Alumno, Conference director.

The four-day event features a full agenda that includes plenary sessions on Industry Perspectives, Opportunities and Risks; Regional Presentation of Best Practices; Global Opportunities in the Retirement Industry; Marketing and Branding for Global Markets; Quality Management and the Continuity of Care; and the Future of Medical Tourism and Healthcare Travel Industry.

The IMWell Summit also includes Executive Workshops about Balanced Score Card in Healthcare Organization and Effective Leadership Styles in Healthcare Organization. Four break-out conference tracks will be presented: Quality in Healthcare, Marketing, Investment and Capacity Building, and Retirement, giving an in-depth look at each specific aspect of medical and wellness tourism.

“We have ensured that the program of the IMWell Summit is comprehensive and at the same time attuned to the needs and gaps in information of this growing field,” states Sanjiv Malik, M.D., a renowned international guru in medical tourism, who sits as the Conference Honorary chairman. “By gathering the region’s leading policy makers, decision makers, and solution providers, we aim to redefine, redesign, and refine health care delivery around the world. ”

The Advisory Board and Speakers of the IMWell Summit include prominent leaders in their fields of expertise, including David Vequist, M.D., of the Center for Medical Tourism Research (USA), Dato Jacob Thomas of the Association of Private Hospitals in Malaysia, Nipit Piravej, M.D., of Bangkok Chain Hospital (Thailand), Ares Leung, M.D., of Union Hospital (Hong Kong), Sam Bernal, M.D., of Cedar Sinai and The Medical City (USA and Philippines), Samie Lim of Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industries, Girdhar J. Gyani, M.D., of the National Accreditation Board for Hospitals and Healthcare Providers (India), Jeff Staples, M.D., of Parkwayhealth (China), Tony Gibson of the Australian Human Resource Institute, Henry Schumacher of the European Chamber of Commerce, and others.

“Aside from our powerhouse line-up of speakers and advisors, what makes the IMWell Summit truly exceptional is the fact that it’s a pioneering event in regional cooperation," adds Alumno. "It is the first of its kind to present the global state of health care, explore current and future opportunities in medical tourism, and map out a strategy for the growth of the entire industry.”

The IMWell Summit is produced and organized by HIM Communications, in collaboration with the Department of Tourism as Host, and supported by the Department of Health, Department of Trade and Industry, Retirement and Healthcare Coalition, Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry, and Spa Association of the Philippines, with HealthCORE and Asian Academy for Healthcare Executives as Knowledge Partners.

For more information about the event, please visit www.IMWellSummit.com, or call (63 2) 910.8030 or 468.9999, or email info@himcommunications.com

The 2nd International Temos Conference on “HEALTHCARE ABROAD AND HEALTH TOURISM” in Cologne, Germany from November 14-16

Some of the emerging topics of treatment abroad to be covered during the conference will include

• Cross border healthcare: supply in line with demand?
• Setting up aftercare in medical tourism: importance of global networking
• Challenge for assistances in the triangle patients – hospitals - insurances: optimal services at optimal costs
• Effective quality healthcare for expatriates: available anywhere?
• Telemedicine in medical tourism and global healthcare: prepared for the future?
• Patient satisfaction in dental tourism: first results of a scientific patient survey

Conference Specials

Welcome reception at European Space Agency’s Astronaut Centre
Start the conference on Sunday evening, 14 Nov 2010 and enjoy a guided tour at the ESA Astronaut Centre. Have a drink, bring your business cards and have a relaxed networking party.

Opening address by UNO representative
Learn more about United Nations global health initiatives on Monday, 15 Nov 2010.

Exhibition and sponsoring modules
Use the opportunity to present your company/association/institution at the exhibition. Find further information about the different options here.

Post conference program
Visit one of the most modern centers for refractive surgery worldwide: “sehkraft eye center Maus” on Wednesday, 17 Nov 2010. Participation is free of charge. Registration is mandatory since the number of participants is limited.

Further information about this event is available on the Temos Conference Website.
Join the International Temos Conference “HEALTHCARE ABROAD AND HEALTH TOURISM” in Cologne/Germany, November 14-16, 2010.
Learn more about German, European and international travellers and health tourists
-  Create networks and discover opportunities
-  Establish new partnerships and businesses
-  Discuss about „musts“, „enablers“ and „barriers“ for health tourism with colleagues from  hospitals, insurances and stakeholders

If you are interested in joining the Conference as exhibitor or sponsor, please get in touch with us via email info@temos-international.com or our conference service phone +49-(0)2204-42648 0. Here you can download our Sponsoring Modules.

Register now via the Online Registration Form