Naslov
Internet Site Review – Medical Tourism Association

Autori
Krešić, Damir

Izvornik
Tourism : an international interdisciplinary journal (1332-7461) 58 (2010), 4; 425-426

Vrsta, podvrsta i kategorija rada
Radovi u časopisima, prikaz, stručni

Ključne riječi
internet site review; tourism; Medical Tourism Association

Sažetak
Internet Site Review – Medical Tourism Association http://www.medicaltourismassociation.com/en/index.html Given an increasing number of people traveling abroad because of better medical treatment or less costly health care, it can be said that medical tourism is becoming an increasingly important market segment within a global tourism market. Having in mind the growing importance of medical tourism, in this issue of Tourism Journal the web site of the Medical Tourism Association (MTA) will be briefly presented. Medical Tourism Association is the global healthcare organization dedicated to promoting the highest level of quality healthcare in a global environment. It is an international and non-profit organization whose membership consists of various organizations from the healthcare system, such as hospitals, healthcare providers, medical travel facilitators, insurance companies, etc. MTA has three tenets: Transparency, Communication and Education. Transparency is aimed at providing clearer insight into pricing and quality of health care. Communication refers to the fact that MTA member have agreed to put aside competition and to work together in order to address all the important issues from this area. The aim of education is to educate and to inform users of health services regarding issues that should be considered while finding health care provider abroad as well as issues concerning patients’ safety. The education is provided through different means: through media, by organizing conferences and by publishing two bi-monthly magazines, the Medical Tourism Magazine and Health Tourism Magazine. The MTA web site is divided into eight different sections, namely “Home”, “About Us”, “Members”, “Join”, “MTA Activities”, “Contact Us”, “MTA Store” and “Healthcare Reform”. The home page of the MTA web site provides a number of quick links to many interesting topics covering wide variety of issues concerning the medical tourism. There are different sections of the web site for the different stakeholders of the medical tourism industry such as patients, governments, insurance companies etc. The home page also provides links to the MTM magazine, download of Membership Catalogue in pdf format and possibility to sign up for free newsletter which will keep you up to date on all MTA news and activities. The section named “About Us” provides brief introduction of MTA activities, their officers and staff and their Advisory Board. Here visitors can find out that MTA is made of four working councils: The Regional Advisory Council is made up of Ministers, Under-Secretaries and invited honoraries from around the world with the aim to support and develop medical tourism worldwide ; Innovation Council whose goal is to identify and develop business opportunities ; Legal Council which will address legal issues concerning medial tourism and Healthcare Quality Council whose goal is to provide transparency and quality in the global healthcare system. The section of MTA web site named “Members” provides insight into wide variety of organizations that are members of MTA, such as hospitals, specialty clinics, dental clinics, cosmetic clinics, facilitators, corporate members, travel and hospitality companies, SPA and wellnes companies and many others. The members can be browsed geographically or by category. Another interesting section of the MTA web site is a section named “Join” where visitors can learn more about benefits of the membership, membership categories or they can read about member’s testimonials, join MTA mailing list and download membership catalogue. The list of membership benefits include access to “Members Only” page, free subscription to Medical Tourism Magazine, classified listings in the MTA directory, different savings, marketing benefits, educational opportunities, networking possibilities, legal help etc. One of the most informative and most interesting sections of the MTA web site is a section called “MTA Activities”. This section covers wide variety of activities undertaken by the MTA such as issuing two bi-monthly magazines, Medical Tourism Magazine, Health Tourism Magazine, activities concerning organization of seminars, webinars and workshops, information about upcoming conferences organized by MTA and other industry events etc. This section also provides access to the subsection named “Research and Surveys” where visitors can find the results from different MTA researches surveys conducted quarterly. The information and results obtained through these surveys significantly raise public awareness about medical tourism. The web site section named “Contact Us” provides the most important MTA contact information. Besides that, visitors are allowed to request a speaker if they are organizing a medical tourism event themselves, to join MTA newsletter, and to follow MTA on most important social networks such as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. The section called “MTA Store” provides the opportunity for the visitors to purchase different MTA publications such as books, magazines subscriptions as well as to buy MTA membership or to enroll into a medical tourism certification process aimed at medical tourism facilitators who are involved in the coordination of patient care for patients travelling from one country or region to another. The “Healthcare Reform” section of the MTA web site is dedicated to the U.S. Healthcare Reform which was signed into law by President Barack Obama in early 2010. This part of the MTA web site is focused on how this healthcare reform will affect different aspects of medical tourism facilitators. This section provides latest information and updates, in the form of webinars, podcasts, research and white papers, concerning U.S. Healthcare Reform legislation. From the technical point of view, MTA web site is very sophisticated. The web site has modern and simple design and, at the same time, it loads very quickly. The navigation is, thanks to nicely done menus positioned on the top of the page, very intuitive making this web site easy for navigation and user friendly. The web site is very informative and numerous web 2.0 and multimedia functionalities, implemented on the web site, add up to the very rich user experience. Overall it can be concluded that MTA web site is a very good web resource for everybody interested in the growing market segment of medical tourism.

Izvorni jezik
Hrvatski, engleski

Znanstvena područja
Ekonomija

POVEZANOST RADA