Read How Medical Tourism In India Is All Set For A Boom?

Private hospitals often earn the wrath of the common or everyday observer. They have, for the lack of a better word, often been branded as ‘five-star’ destinations for patients who can afford a certain kind of medicare and healthcare that is, quite simply, beyond the reach of the commoner or the salaried-class individual.

Expansive rooms, spick and span floorings, the presence of multiple nurses and healthcare experts to attend a patient at all times in atmospheric settings that might draw a cringeworthy reaction from someone accustomed to staying in plush properties, India’s mega private hospitals have made as many headlines for treating patients successfully as they have for charging an individual what one calls, ‘a bomb!’

Yet, what cannot be denied and must be noted is that these very glitzy, fancy hospitals have been a big caterer to the growing boom one has come to associate with the medical tourism in India.

It could be said that for the past decade and a half, there’s been a constant rise in the plane of medical tourism in India. So much so that experts and market analysts are pointing to a rosy picture in the future.

The medical tourism in India is expected to touch a $9 billion figure come 2020 and where it stands at the moment, the period is not too far in sight!

What contributes to the sparkling narrative around the growing medical tourism in India is a new report that has hit the market. Titled, “India: Building Best Practices In Healthcare Services Globally 2019,” the report underlines the fact that India is among the most preferred destinations where it comes to medical tourism practices.

The country currently occupies the fifth position among 41 major medical tourism destinations according to the revered Medical Tourism Index Overall Ranking, 2016.

But all of that said, a key question arises.

What might have contributed to the growth in the market for medical tourism in India?

Experts in the said area are of the view that as the costs for healthcare continue to spiral upwards in most developed countries such as the United States and the United Kingdom, one tends to see more and more individuals opting for India when it concerns private healthcare.

This development has, as a result, made India an affordable alternative in the coming years and the trend is more likely to increase, thereby appraising India’s value as a preferred destination for medical tourism in the eyes of the tourists from far-flung destinations.

Some publications were quick to emphasize the salient findings of the said report and shared:

 The report also noted that the country is one of the preferred destinations for Medical Value Travel (MVT) as it occupies the fifth position among 41 major medical tourism destinations, as per Medical Tourism Index Overall ranking, 2016.

Meanwhile, MoneyControl noted the various destinations that are contributing to the burgeoning culture of medical tourism in India:

Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Bangalore, Hyderabad, and Kolkata are the preferred destination cities for medical tourists arriving in India. Nearly 27 percent of India’s medical tourists head to Maharashtra, out of which 80 percent go to Mumbai. Chennai attracts nearly 15 percent of the incoming foreign patients while Kerala handles around 5 percent to 7 percent.

That said, where it stands in the past few years, then the number of Foreign Tourist Arrivals or FTAs as they are commonly referred to as, has been on the rise. What’s really promising is that the average growth in this segment has been around 55 percent and is expected to be maintained in the coming years.

Needless to say, what this development does is that it not only puts patients in good safe hands, knowing well that upon arrival in India, they’d receive the due medical care that was beyond their reach elsewhere but it also augurs well for the professionals in the healthcare sector in this part of the sub-continent.