New medical travel guidelines released

GHA’s COVID-19 Guidelines for Medical Travel Programs are offered alongside a voluntary Certification of Conformance for hospitals and ambulatory centres that wish to validate compliance against the guidelines, as well as GHA training for healthcare and medical travel professionals on the guidelines. 

The GHA explains that the guidelines focus on the entire healthcare journey, including providing guidance for travel, as well as interactions with the healthcare organisation, hotel, and ground transportation. Reflecting upon the voluntary Certification of Conformance that the firm was also making available, Karen Timmons, GHA's Chief Executive Officer, said that the intention is that this will promote trust and confidence for patients and their families travelling for care or treatment.

Global Head of Health Reinsurance Partnerships for AXA Laurent Pochat-Cottilloux explained that, like most industries, medical travel has been hit hard by the coronavirus crisis and is ‘only now seeing small signs of recovery’. “For medical travel programmes to succeed in this new environment, they must adopt new modalities and protocols for healthcare delivery that mitigate the risk of Covid-19 infections across the care continuum – and, just as importantly, communicate these to traveling patients and other payers to build confidence and trust. The guidelines issued by GHA will support this effort by assisting organizations in implementing Covid-19 protocols that address the unique vulnerabilities of the medical travel patient.”

The COVID-19 Guidelines for Medical Travel Programs are available on the GHA website.