Dubai :
Engineer Essa Al Maidoor, director-general of the Dubai Health Authority (DHA) recently received Renee-Marie Stephano, President of the Medical Tourism Association (MTA) that is a not-for-profit trade association headquartered in the United States of America.
The meeting was held at the DHA headquarters and was attended by Dr Ramadan Ibrahim, director of medical regulation and director of the medical tourism programme, and Linda Abdullah Ruhi, head of healthcare facility regulation unit and project manager of the medical tourism programme.
The two sides discussed cooperation in training courses for medical tourism, cooperation in the field of conferences and participation in the DHA congress that will be held in October to discuss the role of regulation in medical tourism.
The two factions discussed ways to share experiences in the field of medical tourism and participation in global medical tourism conferences.
Al Maidoor provided an overview of the medical tourism strategy of the DHA.
He said that in line with the vision, leadership and encouragement from Sheikh Hamdan Bin Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Crown Prince of Dubai and Chairman of the Dubai Executive Council and as per the goals of the Dubai Health Sector Strategy 2013-2025, the DHA recently announced Dubai’s medical tourism initiatives and that Dubai is relying on its strengths by building a health system that supports excellence in health care with a focus on healthcare professionals, health investment and excellence in services across a diversified range of medical specialities.
He said that the strategy has been designed over two phases, the first one has been chalked out until 2016 and the second until 2020 and that the aim of the strategy is to ensure Dubai features among the top medical tourism destinations around the world.