Costa Rica Medical Tourism leads Central American counties as a the Medical Travel Destination of Choice
Medical Tourism in Costa Rica has seen significant grow over the past decade, and many experts expect to see even greater growth as issues like US health insurance through Obamacare come into play.
Costa Rica medical tourism has accounted for approximately 48,000 procedures in the past year and with the new medical travel business coming on-line everyday it can be difficult to ascertain which information and broker services are best suited to provide potential medical tourists with the quality service they require.
Costa Rica was ranked 36th by the World Health Organization (WHO) which was higher than the U.S., dominated the list amongst the Central American countries for as a medical travel destination.
PROMED (International Promotion for Costa Rican Medicine) has reported significant rise just from 2009 to 2012 with a 20% increase recorded.
With approximately 1300 new businesses in the medical travel sector in Costa Rica already registered, JCI accredited hospital Clinica Biblica recently announced a $40 million dollar hospital in Guanacaste designed to handle medical tourists arriving in the Liberia International airport which has been steadily increasing its access to USA cities.
San Jose Costa Rica continues to add new medical tourism service businesses and an exponential rate and has invested large amounts of money to not only add new medical travel clinics but to upgrade many of their existing facilities to handle the growth.
Medical tourism in countries like Costa Rica has lower the costs for doing businesses and can then pass those savings onto the consumer. Americans are fast realizing the benefits of lower costs in countries like Costa Rica. For example, a surgeon earns hundreds of thousands per year in the United States; the salary is high in order to offset risk. Surgeons in other countries often do not have the same high risk, and include into the equation a lower cost of living, doctors can afford to be paid much less, and subsequently savings are then passed on to consumers.
Costa Rica is an attractive destination for North Americans medical travelers, because of its easy access, usually 5 hours from most cities in USA. Compare this to traveling to Asian destinations where flight times can be over 17 hours. Further, Costa Rica has a long standing reputation as being political stable and a safe destination.
Medical travel “recovery” resort services are also on the rise. Clients can have a medical procedure and included in packages is a “recovery” resort that provides aftercare and monitoring services, all in a “luxury vacation” setting.
Costa Rica Medical Tourism services has proven to deliver the highest quality services at a fraction of the cost of U.S. and is poised to become the global leader in medical travel.