After going overseas to outsource everything from manufacturing to customer services, American businesses -- pressed by rising healthcare costs -- are looking offshore for medical benefits as well.
A growing number of employers that fund their own health insurance plans are looking into sending ailing employees abroad for surgeries that in the U.S. cost tens of thousands of dollars more.
Carl Garrett of Leicester, N.C., will fly to a state-of-the-art New Delhi hospital in September for surgeries to remove gallstones and to fix an overworn rotator cuff. His employer, Blue Ridge Paper Products Inc. of Canton, N.C., will pay for it all, including airfare for Garrett and his fiancee. The company also will give Garrett a share of the expected savings, up to $10,000, when he returns.
Outsourcing: An article in Section A on Sunday about American employers sending workers offshore for surgeries to cut costs in their health plans incorrectly said Blue Cross of California offered insurance plans that covered medical treatment in Mexico. The insurance provider is Blue Shield of California.
Garrett chose to go abroad rather than have the operations locally, where he would have paid thousands of dollars in deductibles and co-pays.
"I think it is a great thing," the 60-year-old technician said. "Maybe it will drive down prices [of surgeries] here in the U.S."
Blue Ridge, which employs 2,000 and funds its own health plan, began studying the idea out of frustration with rising rates at local hospitals, company officials said. Blue Ridge's healthcare costs have doubled in the last five years, to about $9,500 a year per employee.
"The hospitals have a monopoly. They don't care, because where else are patients going to go?" said benefits director Bonnie Blackley. "Well, we are going to go to India."
Every year, tens of thousands of Americans travel abroad for cheaper tummy tucks and angioplasties. This "medical tourism" has typically been reserved for uninsured procedures or uninsured patients.
No major insurer offers such travel, but several employers that fund their own benefit programs have expressed interest, according to consultants and medical tourism agencies. No statistics are readily available on how many companies or patients have undertaken such travel.
Some medical tourism agencies are preparing to offer health insurance plans that outsource all major surgeries abroad. IndUSHealth -- a medical tourism agency based in Raleigh, N.C., that Blue Ridge hired -- said it was in negotiations with several companies.
Earlier this year, United Group Programs Inc., a health plan manager in Boca Raton, Fla., added a Thai hospital to its network of preferred providers. A handful of plan members have traveled to Thailand for treatment in recent months.
