The Luxury Editor was recently invited to Istanbul to discover more about Acibadem, Turkey’s leading private healthcare company, and pioneer of the latest protocols optimising results and safety for cosmetic surgery procedures, including hair transplant.
Luxury medical tourism is an established part of modern life. Living in the USA, UK and Europe means we have a number of options open to us for elective surgery, embracing cosmetic procedures, oncology, fertility, and other highly specialised procedures from heart care to orthopaedics. We can avoid delays in public systems, and access the latest in technology, less invasive surgical techniques, and more personalised care by opting for private treatment in our home country or abroad. Turkey is increasingly a popular choice. Yet how can we be sure, we’re making the right decision?
Turkey is a super hub for medical tourism
Between 2021 and 2022, the number of Brits travelling to Istanbul for medical procedures at Acibadem’s hospitals has increased by 60%. This includes many medical disciplines, but the leading procedures are cosmetic, with breast surgery the most popular choice by women, followed by rhinoplasty. For male patients, probably unsurprisingly, hair transplantation tops the list, also followed by rhinoplasty.
Turkey is a well established destination for international health tourism, with an advanced private sector servicing a global market. It has become a ‘super hub,’ confirms Professor Mehmet Veli Karaaltin, M.D. a renowned aesthetic, plastic, and reconstructive surgeon with Acibadem. Turkey’s geographical position, within a relatively short flight of much of the world, combined with highly educated and experienced doctors, together with much lower medical costs has driven the huge growth in medical tourism to Turkey.
Being well informed
With this enhanced popularity of course comes a responsibility. The country has a mixed perception, and Acibadem, is committed to world-class healthcare, being eager to tell its story and inform patients about how best to choose a private health supplier. As with all medical tourism destinations, there are highly professional suppliers and smaller clinics that are not so well structured they offer a good service. All medical procedures carry risk and patients need to be informed to make the right decision.
Successful patient outcomes
The factors affecting a successful patient outcome appear from the very start of the patient journey.
Firstly, there is the initial assessment. The healthcare provider must effectively assess the patient. Acibadem is opening a network of Health Points. These clinics, outside of Turkey, are based locally so that patients can access free consultations and second opinions, while also allowing Acibadem doctors to assess the patient’s suitability for travel, suitability for their chosen procedure, and then in turn offer professional aftercare. For example, there is an Acibadem Health Point in London, and advanced plans to extend the network in Europe.
Then of course the next important factor is the skills and specialist expertise of the surgeon and medical staff. Acibadem sponsor the finest students in their own university hospital, creating a highly skilled team that goes on to train with the expert surgeons, doctors, embryologists, and oncologists in the network of Acibadem hospitals. All procedures are performed in full-service hospitals, so if a complication should arise, specialists are always immediately on hand to provide help, supported by world-class technology.
In fact, Acibadem partners with the world’s major medical equipment manufacturers, like Siemens, giving them access to the very latest equipment from ultra-high-tech imaging to the newest cancer treatment machines.
Transparency
‘We understand that there is scepticism with regards to medical tourism,’ explained Oğuz Can Şahin, our host in Istanbul, and Manager of International Communications at Acibadem. ‘That’s why we want to be completely transparent, inviting media to our hospitals and Health Points and let them discover in their own way, our quality of medical care’.
The global pandemic has put national, state-run health services under huge pressure, and the backlog in surgeries has exposed many weaknesses. Patients are seeking alternatives to move ahead with surgery, to improve their quality of life, whilst also saving money from the cost of private procedures in their home countries.
Acibadem is keen to highlight that all its hospitals meet or exceed the standards of medical instructions in the UK, USA and beyond yet provide medical services for less money. Often half the price or less.
Each surgeon we met during our visit emphasised the importance of choosing a healthcare provider based on the skills the medical team and the level of technical and medical support provided by the hospital. This is the priority, before price.
Acibadem has multi-disciplinary hospitals, each with advanced intensive care and emergency facilities. They offer surgeries within an environment where the patient has access to a broad range of medical professionals 24 hours a day. This means that procedures are performed in a much safer environment. A smaller clinic, especially when it comes to cosmetic procedures, could never offer this level of medical expertise, whether in our home country or abroad.
Hair Transplant Centre
Turkey is well known for cosmetic procedures, such as male hair transplants. It was not until I met Professor Mehmet Veli Karaaltin, M.D that I began to truly understand the complexities of the procedure and the importance of choosing the right team to perform the operation.
Charismatic and chatty, Professor Karaaltin was easy to talk to. Educated internationally including the USA, he’s fluent in English. He clearly and expertly explained how he has pioneered a new protocol that ensures a very high success rate for hair transplant, including a new regenerative cellular therapy that enables the grafted hair to grow back faster and healthier.
‘This is not a treatment for male baldness,’ confirms Karaaltin, ‘instead it is a camouflage’. The healthy hair is harvested and redistributed on the scalp, so it is imperative that the hair grows well in order to have a good result. Look at the case studies online, the results can from Acibadem can be extraordinary. He’s recently had the procedure himself – his new thick hair makes him look 10 years younger.
He conceded that some clinics have been reckless in their approach leading to patient dissatisfaction and unnecessary health risks.
By contract at Acibadem, the approach is based upon profound amounts of scientific research and testing. He leads an expert team of technicians that follow a strict protocol to make sure that patients are truly suitable for the procedure, that the operations are always conducted with the utmost dedication to safety, that the harvesting of hair maximises the health of hair grafts, and that the patient receives complete care from the moment they make their initial consultation in their home country through to professional aftercare through the Acibadem Health Point infrastructure.
This visit to Istanbul was inspiring. The Acibadem hospitals are extraordinary – combining the design and services of 5-star hotels with a world-class level of medical care, driven by the Acibadem medical university foundation, and continual training and evaluation of the medical team.
To date, as I write this, I have not tried a procedure from Acibadem. I am interested in a hair transplant, and I will be happy to share my experience in due course.
Yet, what I can say, having worked in communications for medical tourism for over 15 years, is that I can recognise that Acibadem is a truly serious healthcare provider. We spent days on-site, from eating in the hospital restaurants (delicious by the way) to meeting surgeons and touring the university hospital training facilities. All very impressive. There is no other word for it. Their website is full of patient testimonials and their doctors have been attracting international recognition for years, like Professor Ahmet Alanay, M.D. whose pioneering work on spine health issues such as scoliosis has made him an international leader.
Thanks to this world-class team, Acibadem is trusted by the state-run healthcare systems of many countries that send patients to Acibadem for treatment – whether for scoliosis of the spine, the need for the latest specialist cancer treatment or for successful IVF.
This is a health provider we are all going to be hearing much more about in Europe, as they continue their international investment and growth. In my mind, this can only be a good thing, as they work to inform patients, so they make the right choices for elective procedures. The health provider also continues to innovate with treatments and procedures to the benefit of the broader health care system, building supportive, beneficial relationships with national health services.
Information
Acibadem is Turkey’s leading private healthcare company and one of the world’s most sophisticated medical tourism providers.
The health provider has 24 hospitals and 14 outpatient clinics across 5 countries, including Turkey, Macedonia, Serbia, Bulgaria, and the Netherlands. It has recently opened a Health Point clinic in London, offering pre-and post-procedure care and aftercare.
Acibadem offers world-leading specialists in a variety of fields from organ transplant, oncology and heartcare to obesity and fertility issues. Acibadem’s centres of excellence include 11 oncology centres, 16 heartcare centres, 10 organ transplant centres, 19 breast health centres and 14 in vitro fertilisation (IVF) centres.
It has an extending its investment in the European market with the opening of its first UK-based Health Point office. As the medical tourism sector continues to grow, the launch of Acibadem’s UK presence offers a new connection point between the UK and Acibadem’s world-class private healthcare services, delivering excellence in pre and post-procedure care.
Find Out More
Address: Acibadem Health Point UK, 68 Little Titchfield St, London W1W 7NG, United Kingdom
Website: acibademinternational.com
