Dubai generated over Dh1.4 billion from the medical tourism sector with around 326,649 tourists visiting the emirate last year, said Dubai Health Authority (DHA) on Tuesday.
The influx of tourists marked a 9.5 per cent increase over previous years and the most popular areas of treatment were orthopaedics, dermatology and ophthalmology, said Dr Laila Al Marzouqi, director of Dubai Medical Tourism Project.
The largest market for the emirate was Asian medical tourists, who accounted for 37 per cent of visitors.
Arab and GCC countries were the second largest market, accounting for 31 per cent of tourists and visitors from Europe amounted to 15 per cent of the total, added Dr Al Marzouqi.
Al Marzouqi said her department was looking at enhancing partner portfolio in the field with more collaborations. Besides targeting growth in numbers, we are also concentrating our efforts on enhancing our partner portfolio.
We have recently included the region’s first holistic health and wellness resort in our portfolio.
This will provide the health tourist a unique opportunity to avail the complete wellness offering in Dubai.
We have also partnered with The Health Bank in a strategic initiative to enhancing the customer experience by offering end-to-end services — right from research of doctors and health facilities to treatment, accommodation, translator services and post-treatment follow-up,” she pointed out.
In a bid to strengthen their position in the medical tourism market, Dubai has participated in a number of global events. The Medical Tourism Council (MTC) represented the emirate at ITB Berlin 2017. One key market for Dubai is Africa and in March, Dubai Health Experience (DXH) participated in the Dubai-Africa Partnership for Better Health Roadshow, with visits to Nigeria and Ghana.
Approximately, 15 health care providers attended, along with a number of travel agents, who promoted the Dubai as a destination and the city’s international medical expertise.
In April, DHA also participated in the 5th Shanghai International Private Health Management Expo 2017. The organisation also held a series of roadshows across the GCC, in association with the Ministry of Economy, under the umbrella of the Visit UAE campaign.
In April, the tourism council also participated in the Arabian Travel Market (ATM) in Dubai, and signed MoUs with The Retreat Palm Dubai – M Gallery by Sofitel as well as The Health Bank.
To ensure that the emirate has an accurate understanding of the medical tourism market in Dubai, in 2015, the Medical Tourism Council initiated a collaboration with the Dubai Statistics Centre to collect patients’ data from the private health sector, outpatient clinics and polyclinics.
The private health care sector was mandated to collate key information on their patients, such as their age, gender, nationality and city of residence.
Private centres are required to submit data periodically to the Dubai Statistics Centre’s e-source, electronic system. The statistics are then used to develop a greater understanding of medical tourism trends so that Dubai can meet visitors’ needs as the medical tourism sector expands.
International and domestic medical tourism
Domestic
2015: 332,474
2016: 323,893
International
2015: 298,359
2016: 326,659
Main age group
25-45 years
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Showing posts with label Dubai Medical Tourism Project. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Dubai Medical Tourism Project. Show all posts
Thursday, 8 June 2017
Wednesday, 22 June 2016
UAE: Medical Tourism Revenue Not Accurate
Dubai had a good 2015 for medical tourism but the numbers need clarification. 296,491 medical tourists came from outside of the UAE.
The headline figures are that Dubai had 630,833 medical tourists in 2015 and targets a million by 2020. But only 296,491 (47%) came from outside of the UAE. Total revenue from both types was US$400 million. Both categories include expatriates working in the Gulf.
Dr Layla Al Marzouqi of the Dubai Medical Tourism Project openly admits that of that 630,833 only 296,491 came from outside of the UAE. The 2020 target for this sector is 500,000.
The figures only come from the 26 hospitals and clinics in Dubai that are responsible for medical tourism. This suggests that actual figures could be higher. In the future the other 2,730 health care facilities in Dubai will collect data to provide a more comprehensive picture of the actual number of medical tourists.
But in Dubai there are only 31 hospitals, so the extra numbers from this mass data collection are not expected to be high.
Within the small population of 4.8 million of adults and children in Dubai are 1.2 million adult expatriates who are working in Dubai. There are millions more working expatriates in the other states of the UAE. Expatriates account for 85 % of the country’s population. 80% of doctors and 90% of nurses in UAE are foreigners.
85% of the working population is expatriate. The Dubai hospitals record the citizenship of patients, not the country they are working in – so the actual medical tourism figures –of people choosing to fly to Dubai for treatment, rather than of international patients already in Dubai- are still an unknown.
There is another interesting puzzle. If you count people travelling within states of the UAE as international medical tourists, then the same rules should apply to the UK, USA, India etc.
Using conventional medical tourism comparisons we should take as the 2015 figure for medical tourists to Dubai as 300,000- as if they come from outside of the UAE then it does not matter if they are expatriates working in the Gulf, Gulf citizens or medical tourists from other countries.
Earlier official figures admit that most business comes from within the Gulf region and as yet Dubai has not attracted many medical tourists from Europe or Asia.
But as prices in Asia are much lower and few Americans or Europeans choose to go to the Middle East for treatment, the question for Dubai is how much money and effort should it spend on trying to attract Asians and Europeans?
Dubai now admits that it cannot compete on price so is concentrating on promoting the quality or care and targeting both Africa and the Gulf.
Dubai is focusing on seven specific areas to attract medical tourists: orthopaedics, ophthalmology, assisted reproductive techniques, dermatology, bariatric and weight-loss surgeries, cosmetic surgery and dental care. It offers packages on all these.
The amount of money, time and effort Dubai has put into promoting medical tourist is significant
The headline figures are that Dubai had 630,833 medical tourists in 2015 and targets a million by 2020. But only 296,491 (47%) came from outside of the UAE. Total revenue from both types was US$400 million. Both categories include expatriates working in the Gulf.
Dr Layla Al Marzouqi of the Dubai Medical Tourism Project openly admits that of that 630,833 only 296,491 came from outside of the UAE. The 2020 target for this sector is 500,000.
The figures only come from the 26 hospitals and clinics in Dubai that are responsible for medical tourism. This suggests that actual figures could be higher. In the future the other 2,730 health care facilities in Dubai will collect data to provide a more comprehensive picture of the actual number of medical tourists.
But in Dubai there are only 31 hospitals, so the extra numbers from this mass data collection are not expected to be high.
Within the small population of 4.8 million of adults and children in Dubai are 1.2 million adult expatriates who are working in Dubai. There are millions more working expatriates in the other states of the UAE. Expatriates account for 85 % of the country’s population. 80% of doctors and 90% of nurses in UAE are foreigners.
85% of the working population is expatriate. The Dubai hospitals record the citizenship of patients, not the country they are working in – so the actual medical tourism figures –of people choosing to fly to Dubai for treatment, rather than of international patients already in Dubai- are still an unknown.
There is another interesting puzzle. If you count people travelling within states of the UAE as international medical tourists, then the same rules should apply to the UK, USA, India etc.
Using conventional medical tourism comparisons we should take as the 2015 figure for medical tourists to Dubai as 300,000- as if they come from outside of the UAE then it does not matter if they are expatriates working in the Gulf, Gulf citizens or medical tourists from other countries.
Earlier official figures admit that most business comes from within the Gulf region and as yet Dubai has not attracted many medical tourists from Europe or Asia.
But as prices in Asia are much lower and few Americans or Europeans choose to go to the Middle East for treatment, the question for Dubai is how much money and effort should it spend on trying to attract Asians and Europeans?
Dubai now admits that it cannot compete on price so is concentrating on promoting the quality or care and targeting both Africa and the Gulf.
Dubai is focusing on seven specific areas to attract medical tourists: orthopaedics, ophthalmology, assisted reproductive techniques, dermatology, bariatric and weight-loss surgeries, cosmetic surgery and dental care. It offers packages on all these.
The amount of money, time and effort Dubai has put into promoting medical tourist is significant
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