Health travel, domestic and international, for the group health benefit sector is an established cost containment option that was for years, used primarily by reinsurers and case management firms and limited to rare, high-cost, tertiary care. Through the use of cost-saving benefit design incentives, employers are testing the receptiveness of plan participants and encouraging plan members to consider a narrow network of high-performance healthcare providers in targeted locations that may be located further from home. In addition to foreign medical tourism, this has given rise to another emerging market - domestic medical tourism. Unlike foreign medical tourism, patients don't leave the country. Instead they travel to another city with the U.S. to have procedures for upt to 75% less than they would pay if they were treated closer to home. Large employers such as Wal-Mart, Lowe's and Pepsi Co are offering employees and dependents heart, spine and transplant surgeries at large medical facilities such as John Hopkins and the Cleveland Clinic, regardless of where they are located in the U.

S. This book addresses how to design and launch a health travel benefit pilot program, plan funding options, quality, safety and logistic considerations, provider selection criteria, and bundled case rate contracting in the USA and abroad. The author also includes many worksheets, checklists and forms to use when designing a health travel benefit program.