Medical Tourism Facilitators: Ethical Concerns about Roles and Responsibilities

Within the medical tourism industry are a number of key stakeholders – groups and individuals who champion the development of the industry, provide services within the industry, use the services of the industry, and/or are directly or indirectly impacted by the industry - who contribute to its expansion. One such group is facilitators, private agents who broker medical travel and foreign care arrangements between patients and destination facilities but are not employed by these facilities. Key to this element of the medical tourism industry is the Internet; facilitation companies in many countries have a strong web presence and rely primarily on websites (and secondarily on word-of-mouth) to advertise their services.Medical tourism brokers’ responsibilities toward medical tourists can include securing travel and accommodation needs, suggesting and booking facilities and surgeons abroad, contacting destination clinics, overseeing translation of medical records, arranging for tourist activities, and transferring medical records.These brokers can play an essential role in facilitating communication, providing information, and securing overall quality control by assessing the reputability and reliability of international facilities.It appears, however, that only a fraction of medical tourists actually use the services of brokers.