MEDIGO, a global online platform that connects patients to high-quality medical care worldwide, is looking to open an office in Dubai by the end of the year.

On the patient side, the company had already been serving local users since end-2014, connecting them to care centers within the MENA as well as overseas. Similarly, it has also connected international patients to medical care in the region.

“The growing volume of patients and our desire in continuing to deliver high-quality support and service has prompted us to open an office in Dubai by the end of the year,” said MEDIGO COO Pawel Cebula.

“We are continuously expanding our MENA hospital and clinic network, which at the moment consists of 20 facilities in Dubai, Abu Dhabi, and Sharjah,” explained Cebula. The UAE network is expected to grow and include 40-50 new facilities in the coming months.

Medical Treatment Discovery and Booking

Headquartered in Berlin, MEDIGO’s network comprises over 500 international clinics and hospitals, offering patients more than 900 procedures in 35 medical specialities including dentistry, reproductive medicine, and oncology.

It also provides comprehensive medical travel coordination and management for both individual patients and organizations anywhere in the world.

Cebula stressed that the “discoverability” offered by their platform gives patients access to treatment options that they would have otherwise remained oblivious to: “Recently, for example, we helped a patient from the UK travel to Dubai for weight loss surgery, even though he had previously never considered Dubai as a treatment destination.”

In addition to medical travel, the company has started offering Care Plans, tiered packages ranging from free “basic” to $2,229 “concierge” bundles, and Second Opinion, which gives users access to a global network of expert doctors for online medical second opinions.

MEDIGO was founded by Cebula, along with Ugur Samut (CEO) and Ieva Soblickaite (CPO). This is their first entrepreneurial venture, but all three have had experience in the startup industry.

Conceiving an Online Medical Directory and Marketplace

A few year ago, while traveling in China, Cebula needed emergency dental treatment, but the difficulty of trying to find a quality dentist who spoke English was frustrating.

Some time later, he helped his mother, a doctor working in Poland, develop a website for her practice. It was then that he realized that doctors typically have difficulty maintaining an online presence and marketing themselves; “Their expertise is in treating patients rather than doing online marketing,” he said.

“I realized the market for medical travel was ripe for disruption, with patients being forced to organize and book their own trips. The same tools that worked for other industries could work here; price comparison, a booking engine, and an online marketplace could make medical tourism a viable option for all patients. I decided that I wanted to help patients by creating a network and support center that would allow them to shop for healthcare on their terms.”

Work on the concept and market research started in late 2013. The website launched with about 20 clinics and hospitals in March of the following year, and started serving its first patients a few days after. In December 2014, the company secured $6.2 million in a Series A investment round led by Accel Partners, which included other prominent investors such as LVMH, a global luxury conglomerate.

Is There a Patient in the Room?

“Thus far, we have had great feedback from both patients and our network of hospitals and clinics. We have also seen a strong growth in site visitors and patient enquires,” said Cebula. The website has 60,000 unique monthly visitors, and is growing at a monthly rate of about 15%.

Patient volumes have been consistently doubling quarter-on-quarter. As of today, MEDIGO has connected almost 15,000 patients from 178 countries with a hospital or clinic. Most patients come from Australia, the United Kingdom, and the United States, respectively.

For these markets the 25-34 age group mostly seeks affordable dental and cosmetic treatment; women aged 35-50 look for cosmetic, IVF, and bariatric treatment; the 54-64 age group look for affordable dental and ophthalmology procedures; finally, the 60+ age group seek shorter waiting times on orthopedic, cosmetic, and ophthalmology procedures.

However, in the newer markets, Russia and MENA, the breakdown differs. There, pediatric and adult patients primarily seek specialist or complex treatments in oncology, cardiology, neurology and orthopedics.

The medical tourism industry is seeing a lot of expansion according to Cebula. He said a number of governments continue to invest in their hospital and tourism infrastructure, and there are several other countries interested in establishing themselves as medical tourism destinations as well.

“There are also a number of new investments coming from venture capital in the healthcare startup space, and it is really great to see that this market is growing and gaining momentum,” he said.

Your Health, Your Choice

“We are changing consumer behaviors by offering a choice of healthcare providers,” said Cebula.

“Depending on where you live, medical tourism could be a household topic or a very rare occurrence, and we’re interested in letting everyone know that going abroad is an option if you can’t access the healthcare you need,” he added.

“The MENA is particularly interesting as a market because it’s both a destination and source country for medical tourism. Locals tend to be outbound for treatment in countries like Germany and Thailand, and a number of expats seek options in their home countries. Looking at inbound trends, international patients choose this destination for its quality of care and specialty in plastic surgery, and bariatric surgery.”

The founders also recognize the B2B opportunities in this space as well; the company has generated interest amongst various organizations that manage healthcare for large groups of patients including employers, insurance companies, and government organizations.

Cebula pointed out that there are a number of medical tourism platforms which serve as lead-generators for clinics and hospitals, and there are many small businesses which provide medical travel facilitation in a specific procedure-destination corridor, operating similarly to travel agents.

However, he said MEDIGO is the largest full-service, online, one-stop-shop platform currently on the market. “Interestingly, many of the existing players recognize the value that we can deliver to them and their patients, and have therefore decided to partner with us to access our hospital network and benefit from the case management services delivered by our Care Team.”

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