Published in The News, Mexico City

Sunday June 22nd 2008

Americans seek Mexican care.

The doctor in the United States told Tyrle Hunter last year that he needed a full hip replacement to repair the damage from a skiing accident. But lacking insurance, the 28-year-old Alaskan fisherman realized it would take him well over a decade to pay for the $60,000 operation.

Forced to reconsider his options, Tyrle found an agency that offered to arrange to have the same procedure performed in Mexico – for a quarter of the price.

Last week, Hunter lay by the pool of his hotel in Puerto Vallarta, recovering after a successful operation by a local orthopedic surgeon.

Hunter is just one of a handful of foreign patients to be operated on in Puerto Vallarta this month, part of a growing trend of custom-made medical travel programs that offer surgery and vacation packages abroad to those U.S. citizens who cannot afford private healthcare in their own country. The industry’s target are the estimated 47 million U.S. citizens living without health insurance, as well as candidates for dental, cosmetic and other elective surgeries, such as Lap Band procedure for weight loss.

The latter operation, in which a band is inserted over a segment of the stomach, thus cutting its capacity and reducing the appetite of the patient, is one of the most common procedures performed on foreigners here in Mexico.

Planet Hospital and MedToGo are just two U.S.-based and certified companies that advise U.S. citizens on healthcare options in Mexico. MedToGo also organises medical travel for its clients, presiding over every detail from specialist consultations to accommodation and airport transfers.

DEEPER INTO MEXICO

However, whereas most cross-border medical procedures take place in northern cities like Tijuana and Monterrey, companies like MedToGo are attempting to bring their patients further into Mexico by highlighting the care available in major tourist destinations like Puerto Vallarta and Baja California.

“It’s a running joke in the United States that anyone travelling to Mexico for a surgical procedure only needs to buy a one-way ticket,” said Robert Page, MedToGo’s Vice President of Operations. “But what we’re trying to communicate to people is that there are medical facilities out here that match or even transcend standards in the United States.”

Page has spent three years screening doctors and hospitals in Mexico, research that culminated in the publication of a hefty health and safety guide to the country, called “Mexico: Health and Safety Travel Guide,” as well as providing a database for patients of physicians who speak English and are certified by the Mexican medical board Conacem.

“The majority of medical tourism is still concentrated in Tijuana and the north of the country,” explained Page, “but we are trying more and more to bring people to leading holiday destinations like Puerto Vallarta because of their already established medical and tourist infrastructures.”

“Medical travellers could be a great asset to the tourist industry in Mexico,” acknowledged Marcelo Alcaráz González, director of the Puerto Vallarta tourism board, who is implementing a promotional program for the city in September, based on its viability as a destination for medical tourism. The tentative publicity drive will take the form of a booklet to be distributed at trade fairs in the United States.

ALL-IN-ONE

MedToGo’s idea behind for a medical travel package is quite simple: a trip to Mexico for surgery combined with some sunshine and sightseeing. Money saved on the procedure will easily pay for the trip, with cash to spare, while the warm climate and proximity to the sea provide ideal conditions for post-op rehabilitation.

Puerto Vallarta is presently one of Mexico’s most popular tourist destinations, with an influx of 2 million visitors per year, a number of who come for the exclusive purpose of consulting with a local doctor.

One such medical vacationer is Jack Brooks, 63, from Lake Arrowhead in Southern California. In Puerto Vallarta for a rotator cuff surgery, he divided his time between consultations at the Cornerstone Hospital and trips into the town centre.

“I was terrified,” said Brooks, a former rock musician, of the initial prospect of undergoing surgery in a foreign country. But from the lobby of his hotel in Puerto Vallarta, he describes his experience as having been “unbelievably positive”.

“It’s been a 180 degree difference from my experience back home,” Brooks went on to say. “The system in the United States makes it difficult for doctors to give as much time as everybody here does.”

Dr. Max Greig is the orthopaedic surgeon that operated on both Tyrle Hunter and Jack Brooks. From his office in the Colonia Lázaro Cardenas in Puerto Vallarta, he performs between 5 to 8 surgeries on non-Mexicans each month, and handles a database of more than 4,000 foreign patients.

“Many U.S. citizens are fed up with various aspects of their healthcare, including the speed with which they are processed as patients,” Dr. Greig explained. “Here we give people time and human care; we address their fears and concerns.”

TIME WILL TELL

Despite the inroads made by companies like MedToGo, however, national and regional tourism boards are biding their time before fully endorsing the trend as a viable industry.

“The problem is that we have no idea of the exact number of people who travel to Mexico for healthcare,” says Rene Rivera Lozano, director general of product development at the Secretary of Tourism, “we don’t know how big the market is, or could potentially be.” Estimates put the number of U.S. citizens who travel abroad for medical care each year range from about 7,000 to 150,000, with roughly 25 percent heading to Latin America.

Medical tourism, along with religious tourism and “wellness” travel, is currently on a list of future considerations for the board, for which there is presently no strategy.

“The domestic market for private health in Mexico is big enough not to need to bring in foreign patients,” said Rivera, recently returned from a convention on medical tourism in Singapore, one of the world’s leading destinations in medical tourism, attracting 370,000 foreign patients a year.

However, some still see the developing market as an opportunity for Mexico: “The United States has some of the world’s wealthiest citizens and most problematic health care systems,” says MedToGo’s Robert Page. “Most Americans researching medical tourism are familiar with Asia as an option but have a very dim and unrealistic view of Mexico’s health care system.”

The industry in Latin America still has a long way to go to match the success of its counterparts in Asia, where the medical tourism industry is long established and expected to be worth $4 billion by 2012.

ROAD TO RECOVERY

Leaning on his crutches, Tyrle Hunter, for one, is looking to the future. Will he now buy health insurance back home in Alaska, or would he return to Mexico for surgery again if the need arose?

As far as indemnity is concerned, he is sceptical: “Doctors back home are so used to taking advantage of people’s insurance; you never know what they’re going to whack you for next.”

Hunter is hoping for a fast enough recovery to be back on the boat by the end of the year. He won’t be able to work with the same physical intensity as he did prior to his accident, but he’s glad he’ll be able to cash his paychecks again.