Can more medical travellers solve UAE’s hospital problem?

Various healthcare players in the UAE are quoted in an article in Gulf News saying there is now overcapacity in hospitals and clinics in Dubai and Abu Dhabi. One solution proposed is to get more medical tourists to come calling.

The article includes quotes from Raza Siddiqui, CEO of Arabian Healthcare Group and Executive Director at RAK Hospital, saying “It’s time that investors take a pause before putting in more funds to build more hospitals. They need to focus on niche health services rather than more of the me-too kind of primary and secondary facilities.”

Helmut M. Schuehsler, Chairman and CEO of TVM Capital Healthcare, says even niche categories are getting crowded. “However, there are opportunities in specialist sectors, [with] consolidation of smaller providers into much larger and critical mass entities being one of them.

The article quotes data from Alpen Capital, saying the number of hospital beds in the UAE could rise to around 15,000 by 2022. There were 12,540 hospital beds as of end 2016, according to official data. “The overall healthcare market is expected to grow due to various drivers, including a growing population, prevalence of NCDs (non-communicable disease) among residents, the roll-out of mandatory health insurance, and others,” said Krishna Dhanak, Executive Director of Alpen Capital.

The article says that the expected rise in demand, from the introduction of universal healthcare insurance in Dubai and Abu Dhabi, hasn’t gone the way it was expected to. Levels of co-payment (ranging from 5-20%); and a local population where 60% are in the 15-44 year category are given as influences.

One solution proposed in the article is to get more medical tourists to come calling. Dubai hosted 326,649 medical tourists in 2016, an increase of 9.5 per cent year-on-year and aims to receive 500,000 tourists by 2020 by relaxing visa procedures and holding promotions, according to Alpen Capital’s Krishna Dhanak. “Abu Dhabi is establishing a medical tourism network to attract patients, mainly from Russia, China and India.”