American Journal of Tourism Management 2012, 1(1): 10-20 DOI: 10.5923/j.tourism.20120101.02 Demographic Phenomena and Demand for Health Tourism Services Correlated in Poland Adam R. Szromek 1,* , Małgorzata Januszewska 2 , Piotr Romaniuk 3 1 Department of Organization and Management, Silesian University of Technology, 41-800 Zabrze, Poland 2 Department of Regional Economy and Tourism, Wrocław University of Economics, 53-345 Wrocław, Poland 3 Department of Health Policy, M edical University of Silesia, 41-902 Bytom, Poland Abstract The changes in the demographic structure of societies are one of the key factors affecting the social and economic life in a modern world. The article tries to identify key demographic changes that affect the demand for health tourism services. It focuses particularly on the situation in Poland, as in this country the worst levels of basic demographic indicators in Europe has been recently observed. Authors utilize the yearly number of spa visitors coming to the Polish health resorts in period 1995-2009. The data were compared with the demographic trends referring to the number of population in 15 age categories, the probability of death, average life expectancy at birth, number of deaths and births per 1000 population. The impact of individual factors was examined by the analysis of correlation between the scale of demand for health tourism services, and the time series on demographic factors. The prediction for the further development of the phenomenon required the use of linear regression and multiple regression. In result of the performed analyses, it is concluded that demographic changes may be a key factor negatively affecting the number of patients coming to Polish spas, and the upward trend observable in recent years in terms of the demand for health tourism in Poland, with a great probability will turn into a downward trend in the forthcoming years. Keywords Demographic Changes, Spa Services, Health Tourism, Poland 1. Introduction The changes in the demographic structure of societies are undoubtedly one of the key factors affecting the social and economic life and the phenomena appearing in these spheres in a modern world. It can even seem that the importance of this factor increases along with the progress of civilization. Changes in the demographic structure of societies also impact the phenomena observed on the tourism market. In case of the health tourism, such an influence may appear in a particularly strong manner. The article is an attempt to identify key demographic changes that affect the demand for health tourism services. For this purpose, ,authors decided to refer to the world most important demographic reports and try to apply the conclusions arising of them at the regional and national level. The paper focuses particularly on the situation in Poland, due to the fact that in this country in the last decade the worst levels of basic demographic indicators in Europe has been observed, i.e. the lowest fertility rate, the highest percentage of people aged 65 years and more, the highest level migration, etc.; see: World Tourism Organization and * Corresponding author: szromek@polsl.pl (Adam R. Szromek) Published online at http://journal.sapub.org/tourism Copyright © 2012 Scientific & Academic Publishing. All Rights Reserved European Travel Commission 2010[1]. At the same time, strong traditions of the health tourism in connection with the medical spa, as well as favorable location of this country and its geopolitical availability, such as membership in the UE and Schengen area, make it an interesting and attractive touristic destination. We can therefore assume that in Poland the impact of demographic changes on the health tourism may be particularly sharply observed. 2. Background 2.1. The Demography in the World Scale As evidenced by the United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) report[1], the total world population between 2009 and 2030 is going to increase from 6.9 billion to 8.3 billion people. Nonetheless, this increase will not regularly spread throughout the world, since some regions will grow, and the other are going to experience a clear decline in population. In Europe, as it is estimated, the decline in population will be by 1%, while in the Americas and in Asia the population is going to increase by 17% and 18% respectively. Only in China and India the population increase is expected to reach 17.6%, 17.9% in the discussed period. Such a trend should not be surprising, since during the second half of the twentieth century there was a several