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India Woos Medical Tourists
aspelling writes "It's not only quality hardware and software that can be done in India for a fraction of the cost. BBC reports that India has a generation of world class doctors capable of doing joint replacement, heart, neuro and cancer surgery at their state-of-the-art facilities. Don't be surprised when your physician prescribes you a trip to Bombay. Indian officials are working hard with HMOs around the world to make this dream come true."
Not to knock the healing hands in India, but I just can't snicker at the thought of my HMO telling me that they've outsourced my hip replacement to the cousin of the guy who replaced my job as a programmer.
--- have you healed your church website?
This is in stark contrast to the jerk who 'helped' me in SF. "Yeah, drink a lot of water. That'll be $400"
If you are on your 3rd bypass, i'd say you've had too many curries already ;)
"Hey! Unless this is a nude love-in, get the hell off my property!!"
If you needed open heart surgery or a liver transplant, would you still go to India to do it because "it costs less money"?
Are doctors in India "certified" by the government? do they get inspected regularly for standards of practice?
I don't want to bash Indian doctors or criticise anyone's decision to valuate medical work purely based on its cost; I just feel the readers should be informed of the potential risks associated with getting major treatments done in other countries just because of financial reasons.
What if I pick a bad doctor and he messes me up or whatever? Who can I sue? In all likelihood hed be gone after I left.
If you disagree post, don't moderate.
Just yesterday a friend of mine with an degree in economics was talking about the push in that field to move much of the work offshore.
This applies to any profession - there is no "safe" field. Look at law - despite what television tells you, most people with law degrees aren't engaging in clever courtroom rhetoric all day, or even at all, but doing "back office" stuff. This, too, can be offshored in time.
I'm not saying that this is a good or a bad thing, or that I have any answers, but it *is* obvious that saying "just get a new career in accounting/law/marketing/whatever!" is naive because there is no strictly "safe" field to start with, and never will be.
While, as an Indian, I am flattered by your opinion, your argument is flawed. I think that the Indians you've met are good at the math and sciences because their parents pushed their children to become engineers.
Furthermore, almost every culture that has existed for thousands of years has had a few great scientists. Are the British inherently any smarter because Issac Newton was British, or the French any wiser because Pascal was French? Obviously not!
Not everyone who goes to medical school is in it for the money. Are there misguided fools who only dream of making quick cash? Sure there are, but you'll find that in any field.
I have been researching a few medical schools as of late, because I wan't to get my DO (doctor of osteopathy) which is the same as an MD.
I hear there has been a shift in the last 10 to 20 years as far as what medical schools are looking for from applicants. They want people who know exactly why they want to be physicians.
I know several fellow paramedics who have just been accepted into medical school with average MCAT scores and are over the of 25.
They understand that these individuals (not just medics, but nurses, EMT's, physican assistants, and people with MBA's who have something to do with medicine) know why they are going to saccrifice their time and effort.
And there are plenty of doctors that I know that don't make that much money. A few general practitioners who work poor urban areas. They do see some patients for free; the equivalent of pro bono work I guess.
As far as medicine being expensive in the West, there are alot more factors contributing to the expenses than a physician's salary.
An HMO is kind of like the Black Knight from Monty Python, except that when *you* get both of your arms cut off, *they* say it's only a flesh wound.
I personally welcome this. Maybe it's because of the bad taste left in my mouth by seeing the local orthodontist brag about how he only worked a couple hours a week, right before he jumped into his multi-million dollar Mitsubishi turbo-prop. My mom just paid several thousand dollars to have a root canal/tooth cap.
Perhaps it's not the best bet for open heart, but for some of the more insanely priced operations like that I think it make senses.
www.eissq.com/BandP.html Ball and Plate System. Amuse your friends. Crush your enemies.
My mother went through angioplasty at the Escorts Heart Research Institute (New Delhi, India, http://www.ehirc.com/). Not only did the operation go smoothly, the total cost of the whole procedure (including stay, doctor's fee, consultations, actual procedure, angiography etc) came to under $4000. Out of this $2000 was for the medicated stent used, which is imported from the US.
(PS: This particular hospital performs over 20 angioplasties and around 8 bypass surgeries daily)
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I refuse to answer that question on the grounds that I don't know the answer.
Ya, I work 80 hours a week (legally that is, in reality I work much more than that but I'm technically limited to 80 hours per week), owe twice as much in student loans as the cost of my condo (condo about $82,000, you do the math) and make 40,000 a year. Sure I'm a resisdent still, but as a general practitioner I'll still work at least 60 hours a week, and oh ya, by the way, I won't be finished with training until I'm 30. I've sacrificed many of my hobbies and pleasures in life to do this. I spend much of my spare time reading to keep up with the lately studies. Do I complain about this? NO. Absolutely not, this is what I choose to do, but comments like this really get on my nerves.
Also, I have to wonder what the legal environment is like in India? How much do these docs pay for legal insurance. Since some surgeons in the US can pay over 100,000/yr in insurance, I would suspect that might account for much of the cost.
People in the US sell their blood for personal profit. Or their babies. Or hire out their wombs. Selling parts of yourself for financial gain isn't exclusive to India, or even the developing world in general: it happens in the developed world too.
"Accept that some days you are the pigeon, and some days you are the statue." - David Brent, Wernham Hogg
You're woefully wrong when you talk about a lack of accredited facilities in India. I'm sorry to say, but it's apparent that you speak out of an unfound prejudice that discounts the quality of Indian medical institutions.
I've only recently returned from that country and how it is progressing. This Harvard Medical associated facility is just the first of many similarly affiliated facilites coming up all over the country. John Hopkins has associates in the Indian market too.. I just can't recall their names. And there may be so many more initiatives underway that I'm not even barely aware of.
Agreed that even all this infrastructure available today doesn't amount to much, but it's more that a step in the right direction for that country.
And more importantly, for those in developed countries that can't afford to pay the high-cost of private healthcare, India offers a teriffic option to get treatment at a fraction of that cost.