The Issue, Challenges and Risk of Post- Surgery Treatment Abroad Among Medical Tourists from Doctors’ Perspective

ABSTRACT

Doctors take great effort in ensuring that their patients understand the risks and difficulties associated with post-treatments undertaken abroad. This qualitative study outlines the risks and challenges facing medical tourists’ when seeking and undergoing treatments abroad and involved 17 doctors from both India and Malaysia. The Protection Motivation Theory (PMT) was used as a foundation of this study, and the data analyzed via thematic analysis. The results confirmed that threat and coping appraisals influence medical tourists’ decision to undertake post-treatments abroad. Doctors’ evaluation of the severity of the treatments and factors such as the lack of specialists, medications, and the doctors’ unwillingness to accept medical tourists for post-treatments in their respective home countries will affect patients’ intention to seek post-treatments abroad. Information pertaining to the post-treatment procedure and close monitoring and collaboration with doctors and service providers in the patients’ home countries will minimize its associated risks.

KEYWORDS:

• Protection motivation theory
• medical tourism
• post-treatment
• risk
• challenges
• medical doctors
• patients

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).