Analysis of Medical Tourism for Cardiovascular Diseases

Catalina Liliana Andrei (), Gabriela Tigu, Raluca Mariana Dragoescu and Crina Julieta Sinescu
Additional contact information
Catalina Liliana Andrei: University of Medicine and Pharmacy „Carol Davila” of Bucharest
Gabriela Tigu: Bucharest University of Economic Studies
Raluca Mariana Dragoescu: Bucharest University of Economic Studies
Crina Julieta Sinescu: University of Medicine and Pharmacy „Carol Davila” of Bucharest

The AMFITEATRU ECONOMIC journal, 2014, vol. 16, issue Special 8, 1136

Abstract: Increasing costs of treatments have led to the apparition of the medical tourism. Patients in high-income countries seek to solve their health problems in developing countries where the cost of medical treatment is much lower. This cost difference has led to the medical tourism industry that is currently estimated with an annual growth rate of about 20%. Cardiovascular diseases are a leading cause of death worldwide. The high cost of treating these diseases cause many patients to seek treatment options abroad. This paper presents an analysis of the medical tourism industry highlighting the factors that led to its development, barriers to medical tourism, and the economic impact of this industry. Although Romania has highly appreciated doctors it hasn’t achieved yet the high level of other developing countries where medical tourism is more intense. Spa tourism is still far from Romania’s potential in this area due to the very small investments and the lack of necessary infrastructure. Using statistical and econometric techniques we examined key health indicators in Romania showing the lack of correlation between the prevalence of cardiovascular diseases, the development of the endowment of the health system in Romania, expenditures on health care and evolution of the number of foreign tourists coming to Romania to treat these diseases. We used statistical data series provided by N.S.I. that were processed using Eviews. We also tested whether there is a causal relationship in the Granger sense between the percentage of GDP allocated to the health care system and the number of nights spent by foreign tourists in resorts in Romania or the number of arrivals of foreign tourists.

Keywords: Medical tourism; spa tourism; cardiovascular diseases; health care; health (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I11 L83 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2014
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.amfiteatrueconomic.ro/temp/Article_1345.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:aes:amfeco:v:37:y:2014:i:16:p:1136

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in The AMFITEATRU ECONOMIC journal from Academy of Economic Studies - Bucharest, Romania Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Valentin Dumitru ().