Price First, Credentials Later: Bookimed Analysis Shows What US and UK Patients Ask Before Treatment Abroad

What US and UK patients ask before treatment abroad: share of patients who raised each topic, among 404 conversations. Source: Bookimed analysis of 600 randomly selected US and UK patient inquiries, Oct 2025 – Oct 2026.

KYIV, Ukraine – October 26, 2026 – Patients from the United States and the United Kingdom who plan treatment abroad ask about price far more often than about the clinic’s credentials. That is the main finding of an analysis by Bookimed, an international medical tourism platform founded in 2014, of 600 randomly selected patient conversations from the past 12 months.

In 404 of these conversations, the patient asked at least one question. Among them:

• About 2 in 3 patients (66%) asked about the price of treatment. UK patients asked about price more often than US patients (71% vs. 59%).
• More than 4 in 10 (44%) asked when treatment could take place.
• About 1 in 5 (20%) asked what the price includes, such as the hotel, airport transfer or tests.
• About 1 in 16 (6%) asked whether the clinic was accredited, certified, reputable or safe.
• About 1 in 16 (6%) asked about possible complications, and 1 in 25 (4%) about follow-up care after returning home.

“Patients often start with the price, and that is natural,” said Yevhenii Kozlov, co-founder of Bookimed. “But the questions they ask least, such as who checked the clinic and who stays in touch after the flight home, deserve the same attention as the price. We went through an independent review ourselves, so we encourage patients to ask every facilitator these questions, including us.”

The full data set is available on request.

Questions worth asking before booking treatment abroad

Based on the analysis, Bookimed suggests that patients ask any clinic or medical travel facilitator five questions before they book:

1. Which international accreditations does the clinic hold, and can I check them on the accrediting body’s website?
2. What exactly does the quoted price include, and what could be added later?
3. Who will perform the procedure, and what is their experience with it?
4. Who is my contact person before, during and after treatment?
5. Has an independent body reviewed the facilitator’s own work?

The last question applies to Bookimed itself. Bookimed holds the Medical Travel Facilitator Certification from Global Healthcare Accreditation (GHA), an independent accreditation body for medical travel. GHA reviewed how Bookimed selects and monitors partner clinics, communicates with patients, protects personal data and manages risk, and awarded the certification on February 23, 2026. The certification is valid until February 2028. Details of the certification: https://us-uk.bookimed.com/gha-certification/

Methodology

Bookimed drew a random sample of 300 US and 300 UK patient inquiries received between October 22, 2025 and October 21, 2026, out of more than 53,000 inquiries from the two countries in that period, excluding duplicates. Only conversations in which the patient wrote at least two messages were included. An AI model labeled each conversation by topic and had to quote the patient’s own words as evidence for every label; labels without a matching quote were discarded. A second, independent labeling pass confirmed 84% of the labels. All labels about clinic accreditation, reputation or safety were also reviewed by a person: 25 of 48 were confirmed, and only confirmed labels are counted. A conversation could cover several topics. No personal data was used in the analysis. The margin of error is about 5 percentage points for all 404 conversations and about 6–7 points for each country separately.

About Bookimed

Bookimed is an international medical tourism platform founded in Kyiv in 2014 by Yevhenii Kozlov and Eugene Khotianov. It has received 1,000,000+ patient inquiries since 2014 and works with 1,700+ partner clinics in 32+ countries; current figures are shown on Bookimed’s About page. The service is free for patients: clinics pay Bookimed a commission, and patients pay the clinic’s own price. 80+ medical coordinators who have a medical education support patients in 10 languages. Bookimed holds the GHA Medical Travel Facilitator Certification, valid until February 2028.

Notes to editors

A spokesperson is available for interview. The full data set is available on request.

Media contact

Hanna Radivilovska, Outreach & Digital PR Manager, Bookimed, [email protected]

Media Contact
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Website: https://us-uk.bookimed.com/