The Medical Tourism Industry in Iran: A Review of Websites Designed for Cross-border Patients

Abstract

Background: Cross-border health care, whether sanctioned by the governments (out-of-country care) or initiated by the patients (medical tourism), is on the rise globally. The medical tourism industry has shown great potential for improvement in Iran. Objectives: We aimed to examine the representation of data elements on Iranian public and private medical tourism websites and evaluate their content maturity. Methods: A descriptive cross-sectional design was used to gather and statistically analyze data from 12 medical tourism websites. Results: The highest level of data representation was provided for medical tourism attractions and destinations, followed by the geographical location of hospitals and the establishment of tourist agencies. Very few websites featured data elements on admission forms. Fisher's exact test revealed no statistically significant difference in the representation of data elements between the providers of medical tourism websites (P > 0.05). Most privately owned medical tourism websites and only one in the public sector had a moderate-content status. No website was confirmed to be rich or poor regarding their maturity. Conclusions: More investment is required for the development of information and communication technology infrastructures in the Iranian medical tourism industry to attract foreign service-users, although many other factors such as political and economic forces may be involved.