Interview: Ex-Bumrungrad CMO on what becomes of SEA’s med tourism

A paradigm shift in healthcare needs and consumer behaviour has changed the game for medical tourism. For healthcare expert Ruben Toral, who had a front-row seat to Southeast Asia’s medical travel boom in the last two decades, finding a new course for growth will be the new challenge once the pandemic subsides

Medical tourism is one of Covid’s casualties. Private hospitals, clinics and destinations that are dependent on foreign patients are feeling the pain

The cost advantage of medical tourism in Southeast Asia has been neutralised by the added costs, risks and time of increased travel curbs during the pandemic

The uptake of telemedicine and greater emphasis on health and well-care will change how people seek healthcare procedures at international destinations

To regain prominence, Toral thinks it’s critical for Southeast Asia’s medical travel sector to find its footing through tech innovation and intervention

“I’ll never forget the moment when 60 Minutes, America’s premier news show, contacted me to do a story on the hospital. It was like reaching the peak of Mt. Everest.”

Ruben Toral remembers those days fondly, when Thailand’s Bumrungrad International Hospital, where he was the group marketing director from 2001 to 2007, was at the epicentre of Asia’s medical tourism boom. “We had an exceptionally great product and we were the first movers.”

As much as the 12-minute TV segment on Asia’s emerging medical tourism market, which aired in 2005, marked a high point for Toral’s healthcare career, it also anchored the growth trajectory of Bumrungrad as one of Southeast Asia’s top medical travel hotspots.

AUTHOR

Xinyi Liang-Pholsena

Xinyi—who is from Singapore but based in Bangkok, Thailand—joins us as a reporter primarily covering travel and tourism with a business lens. She’s spent the last decade writing about the business of travel in Southeast Asia for publications that include TTG Asia, Travel Weekly Asia and Skift.

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