Caymans’ Tourism Industry Backs Medical Tourism Initiative

The Cayman Islands Tourism Association (CITA) is backing a plan to build a medical center on Grand Cayman as the mainstay of a thrust to develop a full-fledged medical tourism industry that will eventually include U.S. based travel sellers and potentially inject millions of dollars into the destination’s economy.

Renowned Indian heart surgeon Dr. Devi Shetty’s proposed Narayana Cayman University Medical Center is scheduled to break ground in January 2011. The first phase, a 200-bed facility, will begin receiving cancer, cardiac, orthopedic, and major general surgery patients 18 months later, in mid-2012.

If forecasts provided by project developers come to fruition, the proposed medical center will significantly increase visitor arrivals and tourism revenues for the Cayman Islands, and stimulate tourism infrastructure development. Developers claim that medical tourism associated with the new center will generate 87,600 tourism arrivals in the Caymans by 2013 and an additional 1 million arrivals by 2025. The initiative is also projected to add $4.4 million to the destination’s economic coffers by 2013, increasing to $56 million by 2024. It is also expected to stimulate the construction of 10,000 additional hotel rooms.

Earlier this year Shetty told the Cayman Islands business community that he expects procedures at the new medical facility to cost patients about 60% less than identical surgeries in the United States.

The center plans to market its services to medical travelers in the U.S. and Latin America. CITA president Harry Lalli, who is also president of Treasure Island Resort, Grand Cayman, told Travel Market Report that target markets in the U.S. will include Miami, Tampa, the New York area, Chicago, Charlotte, Houston and Toronto, which are all major gateways with nonstop air service to the Caymans.

Once the center is up and running, CITA will reach out to U.S. travel sellers so they can tell their clients that medical travel is available in the Caymans, and begin selling this potentially lucrative segment of the travel industry, Lalli said.

“Medical travelers usually are accompanied by two or three other travelers. Typically, especially if it is not a major procedure, they will extend their stays to enjoy the destination,” Lalli said. “They stay in our members’ hotels, and eat in our members’ restaurants, rent cars, and patronize grocery stores if they are staying in a vacation condo. Those activities will help the whole tourism industry and that is why we are fully supportive of the plan.”

Grand Design

The planned 500-acre, 2,000-bed Cayman complex is modeled on Shetty’s Narayana Hrudayalaya Health City in Bangalore, India, a 3,000-bed complex with separate hospitals for cardiac, cancer and eye patients, as well as trauma and orthopedic centers. The entire Cayman project, which will include a medical school, will take about 15 years to complete.

Mark Scotland, health minister for the Cayman Islands, said in a prepared statement that the Caymans have high expectations for medical tourism; it is expected to develop into one of the three primary pillars of the destination’s economy, alongside general tourism and offshore financial services.

“We already have all the attributes necessary for success — an established tourism product, easy access by American visitors, political stability, and a reputation as a safe destination in the Caribbean,” Scotland said, in announcing the agreement with Shetty to build the medical facility. “Not to act on it would be a missed opportunity.”

Although the center’s site has not yet been officially announced, Lalli has heard that one area under serious consideration is the East District on Grand Cayman, a 30-minute drive from the capital of George Town.