Medical travel

Health tourism, which is also called medical trip, means visiting abroad countries for medical services.

Usually, these trips are combined with a vacation. The concept of medical tourism is not new. In the 4th century BC, Epidaurus was a center of praying and treatment for those visiting Anatolia all around the Mediterranean sea for the sake of healing and being relived from various diseases.
For a couple of decades, cures applied in the Dead Sea are considered as an accepted treatment method for skin diseases psoriasis and eczema.

Why to travel far?

There are several reasons for Health tourism. Some are long waiting periods to have an operation as this is the case in England, lacks of insurance coverage in USA, confidentiality in a surgery, temperature, environment, staff and a better climate.

Western people travel abroad especially for dental and aesthetic surgeries and the address they choose for eye laser treatments is particularly Istanbul, Turkey.

These are the services that are not covered by a medical insurance in Switzerland and therefore the price becomes significant. Treatment costs abroad are really below the tariff the Swiss hospitals and doctors demand, in general.

You may read a report on Turkey’s medical tourism in English here. You may also find this article on Wikipedia, under the title “dental tourism”.

Did you know that Istanbul was in 2010 the capital city of cultures in Europe? You may find the detailed information here.