Health-tourism and two branches. Medical-tourism and Wellness tourism. It is a phenomenon where a patient travels domestic/overseas, with/without a companion, for medical treatment. Medical treatment/surgery could be invasive and involve complex surgical procedures with the use of highly specialized medical technology and skilled surgeons, for the improvement of health and quality of life. MTs may combine it with a vacation if health permits at an exotic destination, pre or post-surgery for recuperation.
Published in Chapter:
Digital Health Innovation Enhancing Patient Experience in Medical Travel
Copyright: © 2020
|Pages: 23
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-7998-3274-4.ch002
Abstract
Digital health technological innovations are disrupting every sector of the economy, including medical travel/tourism. Global patients as medical tourists are using patient-centric digital health technologies, enhancing patient/medical tourists experience and making it more transparent and engaging with healthcare providers and medical tourists. Digital communication tools such as e-mail, online appointments, smartphones, instant messaging applications, social media tools, user-generated content by online patient communities, tele-medicine, tele-radiology, my-Health records, Skype consultation, WhatsApp, health video, electronic health records, health data analytics tools, and artificial intelligence-enabled health technologies enhance the medical travel decision-making process, reduce cost, improve patient care and transparency of communication, and engage the relationship between the patient and the healthcare provider with positive outcomes, medical tourist experience, and empowerment.