Iranian Medical Tourism Industry and Selected Countries in 2020: A Comparative Study

Abstract

Background: Today, medical tourism is a growing phenomenon in the healthcare industry, especially among developing countries. Objectives: The purpose of this study was to compare the Iranian medical tourism industry with selected countries. Methods: This comparative study was conducted in 2020. Data were gathered from databases, including PubMed, Web of Knowledge, Scopus, Magiran, SID, and websites of the World Tourism Association, the Ministry of Tourism, and the Ministry of Health of the selected countries from 2000 to 2020. A researcher-made checklist was used to collect data. Selected countries were compared in terms of the status of tourism and travel competitiveness, governance and policy-making status, the status of the medical tourism industry, and medical tourism infrastructure Results: The main difference between the selected countries and Iran lies in the organizational structure of the main stakeholders of the tourism industry. In other countries, this industry is organized and supervised by specific coordination bodies. In terms of tourism and travel competitiveness, Singapore, with a global rank of 17, was better than other countries. Based on the status of the medical tourism industry, Costa Rica ranked 7th in the world, and Singapore, the UAE (Dubai), Turkey, UAE (Abu Dhabi), Jordan, and Iran ranked 15, 22, 27, 31 35, and 41, respectively. In Iran, all indicators of medical tourism infrastructure were lower than those of other countries except for competitive prices. Conclusions: Considering a low rank of Iran in all the studied components, the organizational integration structure of the medical tourism industry and increasing competitiveness can help the development of this industry in Iran.