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Medical tourism emerges
by Tom Fletcher
First it was private surgery clinics. Then a new Vancouver clinic announced it was offering personalized family medicine in exchange for healthy annual fees. Now a Burnaby-based service is marketing "medical tourism" to BC residents on surgical waiting lists.
Medsolutions, a hybrid of travel agency and surgery referral system, is marketing its links with the Krishna Heart Institute in Ahmedabad, India, with patient testimonials about luxury service in an exotic setting. The company says it is working on similar arrangements with surgical facilities in Mexico, Costa Rica, Brazil and Argentina.
The most controversial service in BC so far is Copeman Healthcare Centre, poised to open in Vancouver. For an enrolment fee currently set at $1,200 and $200 a month, patients would receive a range of medical services.
While Copeman now emphasizes services such as personalized health education, diet and fitness advice, critics say its main intent is to replace service offered by family doctors, and charge fees in apparent violation of the Canada Health Act. BC Health Minister George Abbott was on the defensive in the B.C. legislature this week over the issue.
"If this minister believes that an annual facility fee and sign-up fee that clearly confers privileged access to a doctor doesn't violate the provincial and federal laws, can he tell us what stops any primary care physician from charging patients an annual fee?" asked NDP MLA Shane Simpson.
Abbott replied that the BC health ministry has exchanged letters with the Copeman clinic and has been assured that it will operate within the Canada Health Act and BC's Medicare Protection Act.
In an earlier interview, Abbott said BC hospitals are making progress in reducing surgical wait times, and by the end of this year there will be national "benchmarks" established for some procedures, as agreed in the federal government's latest deal with provinces to increase funding.
Abbott took part in a meeting with federal and provincial health ministers Oct. 22 to work on "science-based" limits for waiting time.
"For example, what's the optimal period between being identified with congestive heart failure, and when you should have either open heart surgery or angioplasty?" Abbott said. "Those are the sort of issues we look at; they're not simple."
He said the safe waiting time for some treatments, such as radiation therapy for cancer, are easy to determine based on clinical evidence. Other procedures are more difficult to assess.
"Particularly when you get into orthopedics, often you make a qualitative judgment about pain and suffering, or utility, as opposed to a definitive measure of science," Abbott said.
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