의료관광 연구에서 관광학의 접근방법

How to Approach Medical Tourism Research from the Perspectives of Tourism Science

This study was to revisit the concept of medical tourism, to analyze tourism elements in medical tourism, and to suggest approaches for medical tourism research from the perspective of tourism science. A critical review of previous literature on medical tourism indicated that existing studies on medical tourism, both in the field of tourism sciences and medical sciences, did not closely examine diverse aspects of tourism elements in medical tourism. Based on the finding of this study, future research directions were provided to enhance the quality of medical tourism research in Korea. These areas include concept and scope of medical tourism, eligible sample, tourism elements to be included, research instrument, information release, communication, and cultural adaptation. This research concludes that tourism approach needs more tourism ingredients in medical tourism research.