Medical Tourism Entrepreneurship: The Case of İstanbul

Abstract

Medical tourism has an important share among the types of health tourism with its contribution to the country's economy. Istanbul has a serious impact on this share. It is considered that it is important to reveal the situation of the sector in order to develop the potential of Istanbul in medical tourism especially in private hospitals and to realize the medical tourism activities in public hospitals more effectively. In this context, interviews were carried out with hospital administrators and chief physicians / chief physicians. At the same time, the medical tourism potential of Istanbul was evaluated with SWOT analysis. Among the important results of the study, it is observed that the supports given to enterprises are effective and the supports are expected to continue and the problem of the sector is lack of professional intermediary institutions. It has been determined that physical rehabilitation is needed for effective medical tourism activities in public hospitals and studies for foreign language education of health workers are needed. Among the important findings of the SWOT analysis results, while the health services offered in Istanbul are cheaper than other countries, it is seen that Istanbul is the most important threat.