Doctors have ethical restrictions for doing marketing, and for that reason there are Patient Referral Services that with supposed objectivity advice patients as to which doctor to go. They have existed for a long time, but the web based ones are easier to run, more efficient and have wider reach.
Medical Marketing can sell the previous two medical businesses, EMR and Telemedicine. They can first convince the patients that they need an EMR, in order to recommend a specialist or sub-specialist. In order to produce the EMR a medical assistant and probably a doctor are necessary, so this is already Telemedicine. Once the patients have an online EMR, a remote doctor can provide some advice, maybe suppressing the original need for a physical encounter with a doctor.
Medical Marketing is currently applied to clinics or health organizations within a certain geographical area. However, some services are likely to be sold internationally, like Dentistry, laser eye optic correction, all kinds of cosmetic surgery and controversial surgeries like abortion, in vitro fertilization, cloning, sex change or virginity restoration.
Here in Argentina there are several opportunities for that, and the country already receives lots of Health Tourists. Let’s do a simple math to find the balance point: a round trip airfare from North to South America can cost U$D 1200, and 3 days hotel maybe 200 more. Procedures that are not covered by medical insurance, and cost over 2000 in the US, are likely to cost from 20 to 40% here.
Personal View
A step further would be to fit a boat with medical facilities and Argentine or other qualified and inexpensive doctors, and approach her to the coasts of Miami or London. The boat could carry the flag of some Medical Malpractice paradise, like Ruanda or Etiopia. To round off the project we need a country that allows alcohol and casinos. Convalescence does not need to be boring. If patients do not come to you, you go to the patients…