Americans Traveling to Mexico for Healthcare

We have all heard about medical tourism, people going to other countries to get better healthcare. Interestingly, many Americans assume that immigrants come here to get better treatment when in reality many American leave the country to go elsewhere to get better treatment. A new study by the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research states that nearly 1 millions Californians seek medical care in Mexico annually.

Driven by rising health care costs at home, nearly 1 million Californians cross the border each year to seek medical care in Mexico, according a new paper by UCLA researchers and colleagues published today in the journal Medical Care.

An estimated 952,000 California adults sought medical, dental or prescription services in Mexico annually, and of these, 488,000 were Mexican immigrants, according to the research paper, "Heading South: Why Mexican Immigrants in California Seek Health Services in Mexico."

"What the research shows is that many Californians, especially Mexican immigrants, go to Mexico for health services," said lead author Steven P. Wallace, associate director of the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research, which conducts CHIS. "We already know that immigrants use less health care overall than people born in the U.S. Heading south of the border further reduces the demand on U.S. facilities."

Even Governor Schwarzenegger acknowledges that immigrants are needlessly scapegoated on budget issues