Nigerian Tourists’ Concerns Towards Medical Risks and Social Challenges

Abstract

The hasty practice of moving to foreign countries for high tech medical services is hinged on a diverse range of motivators of which developing countries like Nigeria can take advantage of. This paper explored the reasons behind Nigerian consumers’ outbound medical tourism; identified the risk factors that give Nigerians concern over engaging in medical tourism; and determined the effect of cost of treatment on outbound medical tourism. Using a structured online questionnaire, data were obtained from a judgemental sample of 100 medical tourists. The data gathered were analysed using descriptive statistics and linear regression analysis. The findings showed that Nigerians undertake outbound medical tourism due to improper medical treatment in home country, infrastructural inadequacies, commensurate cost of treatment in destination countries and availability of qualified health service providers abroad. The three major risk factors include; lack of insurance coverage, cultural differences, and travel time/distance. Lastly, cost of treatment significantly and positively affects Nigerian patients’ outbound medical tourism intention. The implication is that government and non-governmental agencies should aggressively develop medical facilities in the nation’s tourism hub to meet up international standard and discourage medical outbound tourism.

Keywords

• medical tourism
• tourism marketing
• health service marketing