Medical tourism competition: The case of Turkey

Productivity differences between countries lead to trade gain. According to the Heckscher-Ohlin model, differences in labor skills and physical capital between countries cause productive differences and then increases competitive power. In recent years, there has been a rapid growth in the medical services market and related international trade in the world. Turkey is one of the countries with high competitiveness in this market and wants to increase the market volume, because Tur has relatively better service quality, well-equipped hospitals, geographical location and large comparative cost advantage. The aim of this paper is to examine Turkey’s competitiveness as a popular health care destination in the world. Numerical data and our analysis indicate that Turkey's competitiveness in medical tourism is high.