http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/arti ... 868332.cms
Outsourcing blues? Have a heart!
WASHINGTON: India's great outsourcing debate with the United States may have just moved from software to 'heartware.'
Defeated by exorbitant health care costs in the United States, a North Carolina worker flew into New Delhi over the weekend for a heart surgery on the cheap.
Howard Staab was wheeled into the Operation Room at Escorts Heart Institute at 9 a.m. on Monday listening to "Oh Brother, Where Art Thou," with dhanyavaad written on his chest with a purple marker.
He was out in the Recovery Room by 3.30 p.m. with "every best case scenario plan implemented," according to his partner Maggi Grace. A team of doctors led by the well-known cardiologist Dr Naresh Trehan fixed a broken mitral valve in his heart.
The cost of the procedure and after care in India – less than $ 20,000, compared to the $ 200,000 Staab was asked to fork out in the US.
Although 'health tourism' and outsourcing of medical procedures has been on the horizon for some time, this is one of the first instances of an American worker seeking out India for high-end medical treatment.
"This is happening because of the prohibitive cost of health care in the US," Dr Vinay Malhotra, a Seattle cardiologist said in an interview while assessing the milestone event. "I don't see the medical profession here objecting to this, but if this becomes a trend, the insurance companies could well be up in arms."
Howard Staab's health woes began in July this year when doctors discovered a broken heart valve after a routine physical. A 53-year carpenter with an active lifestyle, Staab never had – and could not afford --health insurance. Some 45 million Americans do not have health insurance, which can now run up to $ 500 per month per individual.
When he shopped around post-diagnosis, insurance companies quoted astronomical premiums for policies with limited benefits because it was a pre-existing condition.
"I've always thought that the insurance companies are the real terrorists of our country," Staab said in an interview to a local paper later. "They put terror in everyone's mind. You don't have insurance? You could have a catastrophic accident or illness."
But with no insurance cover, Staab and his partner Grace began exploring other avenues for affordable treatment. Around this time Grace's son Bryan Maxwell, a medical student at Stanford, had returned to the US after spending the summer in India.
Maxwell and his professor from Stanford, Dr. Sakti Srivastava, connected the couple to Dr Trehan, the New Delhi cardiologist who now has a fabled reputation after returning from New York a decade back to set up practice in India.
When they landed in New Delhi in the early hours of Saturday, they were received at the airport by Dr Trehan's staff who scooted them past hundreds of passengers to get them through customs.
"Everyone is so incredible. No worries. Howard is waited on like royalty," Maggi Grace recorded on the website
www.howardsheart.com , which chronicles their Indian healthcare experience.
According to Dr Malhotra, India is a relative newcomer to the healthcare tourism from the U.S. Americans have been trickling into specialized hospitals in Thailand and Singapore even as healthcare costs have been rising fast enough to cause cardiac arrests among the working class and senior citizens here.
A report released by a non-profit outfit Families USA this week said insurance premiums have gone up by 36 per cent in the last four years and are rising three times faster than workers' wages.
"For a blue collar worker earning just above minimum wages, what is the option?" asks Dr Malhotra. "India will become the destination as more and more lay people know about this."
