Entrepreneurship in Oklahoma City leads to medical tourism

Oklahoma City has become a medical tourist destination, according to Dr. Keith Smith: “Oklahoma City has become a major medical tourist destination because of entrepreneurial physicians committed to quality and value.

People have been flying in all over the country and outside to get their care in Oklahoma. The reason is the ability for healthcare consumers to research costs at several Oklahoma facilities.”

Since Smith began publishing his prices online he has started seeing patients traveling long distances from within the USA or overseas-rather than just from nearby states and Canada. The agreement to publish prices has extended to other local clinics and hospitals.

Smith is also founder of the Free Market Medical Association, a membership organization advocating the practice of free market medicine. Numbers are small but increasing.

Smith believes that transparent pricing is the best hope for reducing costs in healthcare. “The solution is not found in the government or insurance carriers, but in opening up and allowing a free market system of transparent pricing to work in healthcare, as it has in other industries. In our experience, we have seen prices plummet and quality soar. The patients are extremely happy.”