Just over a year after opening Health City Cayman Island has been awarded the gold seal of approval from Joint Commission International, and now is part of an elite club of top-class hospitals around the world.
Health City is only the second hospital in the Caribbean, after the Doctors hospital in the Bahamas, to receive the international accreditation from the international arm of the accrediting organization for hospitals in the United States.
The hospital already receives a number of U.S. patients but is still running far below capacity at around 22 percent. The accreditation will help boost the numbers higher and the head of medical services, Dr. Abraham “hopes to have the facility running at 75 percent to 80 percent capacity by the end of the year”.
The vision of the hospitals founder, Dr. Devi Shetty, has always been to bring affordable, quality healthcare to the Americas. The biggest hurdle in the way of this has been getting recognition from major U.S. insurance companies; this accreditation will make it easier for insurance companies to send to the Cayman Islands.
The growth of patients will have a direct effect on the local Cayman economy with hotels, Cayman Airways, car rentals, restaurants and local businesses all looking to benefit from the hospital’s development. The accreditation will help cement the potential to make medical tourism the third pillar in the Cayman Island economy, behind financial services and tourism.
Health City Cayman Island’s Director of Marketing Shomari Scott said “it was important for the hospital to demonstrate the positive outcomes, quality of care and value for money before it would be able to attract significant numbers from the North American market”. He also went on to say “while the USA was a major target, the hospital was also marketing its services in Canada because even though that country has socialized healthcare, there were waiting lists. People that are looking to pay in order to speed up access to surgeries were potential patients for HCCI”.
During the press conference Dr. Abraham also said “the facility would be opening a new state-of-the-art sleep laboratory” as well as “plans for developing spinal and neurosurgery as well as bariatric surgery for those suffer from serious obesity”. This is in addition to the phase two of development that will see a hotel and campus housing being built.
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