Chapter 7
India: Emerging as Major Destination
of Quality Healthcare Services
Arindam Banik and Pradip K. Bhaumik
Analysis of Primary Data
Profile of Patients
A survey of 190 patients who had come to India from other South Asian coun-
tries to avail of medical services was conducted during the period of 1914–1915 to
understand the trade-related barriers and their effect on actual patients. This chapter
captures the essential aspects of the survey.
Tables 7.1 and 7.2 present a socio-demographic and socio-economic profile of the
patients. We can see that an overwhelming majority (about 79.5%) of the patients
is male and more than half are in the age group 40–59. Not so surprisingly, about
95.8% of the patients are from Bangladesh and about 61.0% of these foreign patients
have studied up to SSC/HSC or above.
The largest number of patients is from single earning member households, and
for such households, the average number of dependents is 4.97. It must be very
difficult for such households to travel to another country for the treatment of one of its
members—particularly when we also observe that the average income per household
for such households is only 235623.40 in local currency (which effectively means
Bangladesh Taka). For double-income households, the average number of dependents
The authors would like to express their deepest gratitude to the South Asia Network for Economic
Institutions (SANEI) in Kathmandu, Nepal for allowing us to use some contents of the Chapter 7
of the report entitled, “Trade in Health Services in South Asia: An Examination of the Need for
Regional Cooperation” submitted by the authors.
A. Banik (B )
International Management Institute, Kolkata, India
P. K. Bhaumik (B )
International Management Institute, New Delhi, India
e-mail: pkbhaumik@imi.edu
© Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2020
A. Banik (ed.), Trade in Health Services in South Asia,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-2191-1_7
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