Korea Tourism showcase its medical tourism facilities
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In an effort to promote Korea as a medical tourism destination, Korea Tourism Organization (KTO) organized a ‘Korea Medical Tourism Evening’ at Intercontinental hotel Abu Dhabi. 
The event looked at more than 100 participants who got a chance to understand the variety of Korean medical tourism products.
Korea has been regarded as one of the fastest growing nations in medical tourism sector, welcoming 122,297 medical tourists from across the globe last year. The level of medical expertise in Korea is known to be comparable to that of America, Particularly in the areas of spinal treatment whether with surgical care or with traditional Korean Medicine, prostate diseases, diabetes/obesity treatment, hip replacement and plastic surgery.
Seung Hyun Hwang, Regional director of KTO Dubai said: “The hospitals in Korea offer the latest in medical technology and even medical equipments in patient treatment. We can assure quality medical services with almost 70% compared to USA and Europe.”
The Middle East, with an average annual outbound growth rate of 5.8%, is the fastest growing outbound tourism market in the world, and KTO hopes that by introducing medical tourism in this region, they can a growth of medical travellers from this region. To make Korea easier for Arab patients, the country has made inroads into personalized services for Muslim/Islamic patients, like implementing guidelines in the aspects of clinical care, food services, religious observances, apartment type of accommodations, translation services and much more.
In November 2012, Korea recorded 10 million arrivals for the first time with an increase of 14.9% compared to previous year. The Middle East arrivals was recorded at 91838 tourists until end of September 2012, a 19.3 % increase over same period last year and the GCC arrivals were recorded at 11054 tourists for the same period, an increase of 20.1% over previous year. Tourists from UAE recorded the highest number of arrivals among GCC residents with a growth rate of 32.1% compared to previous year.
