International healthcare giant Mayo Clinic continues its international expansion with the opening of a new patient referral office in Mumbai. The office will help patients considering treatment at one of the three Mayo Clinic facilities in the USA or at Mayo Clinic Healthcare in London. Staff will be fluent in Hindi and English and can coordinate appointments and help with travel, accommodation, and insurance arrangements.
The move is part of a continued expansion of Mayo Clinic activities and links to the world outside the US, particularly the Middle East and Asia. Mohamad Bydon, the Clinic’s Medical Director for the Middle East and Africa Region, explained: “Mayo Clinic seeks to serve as a resource for patients and health care providers around the world. Our international patient information offices help us provide patients with a seamless experience when seeking care at Mayo Clinic.”
Recently, Mayo Clinic also established a representative office in Dubai to assist patients, their families, referring physicians, and embassies in the UAE in seeking treatment at Mayo Clinic locations in the United States.
The Mumbai and Dubai offices are the latest additions to an impressive network of international representative offices in Canada, Colombia, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Panama and Peru. Mayo Clinic opened a similar office in Jakarta, Indonesia in March 2023, and plans an office in Montevideo, Uruguay, from mid 2023.
Sharing knowledge
The Clinic is a non-profit organisation which manages research centres, graduate schools, hospitals and clinics throughout the USA. It is the largest integrated not-for-profit group practice in the world.
When the Mayo Clinic first launched its presence in the Middle East in 1998, the Regional Director explained that nearly half of the several thousand Arab patients seeking treatment at the Clinic in the USA each year came from the Emirates.
Through its Care Network, the Mayo Clinic gives affiliated hospitals access to its specialists, educational materials and other resources. The network was started in 2011 and now includes more than forty hospitals. Initial expansion within the USA was soon followed by international members. Medica Sur in Mexico joined the network in 2013. The American Hospital Dubai was the first healthcare organisation in the Middle East to join the care network in 2016, swiftly followed by Run Run Shaw Hospital in Hangzhou, Zhejiang, China (2017) and Myonghi Hospital in Korea (2018). AIG Hospitals in Hyderabad was the ninth healthcare facility outside the USA to become a member in 2019 and the first in India. Medical Centre Puerta de Hierro in Mexico joined in 2019, followed by the Saudi German Hospitals in Cairo, Egypt (2019) and Riyadh, Saudi Arabia (2020). Xi’an Gaoxin Hospital and Xi’an International Medical Center Hospital in China joined in 2021. In January 2023, Pertamina Hospital (RSPP) in Jakarta became the first member from Indonesia in the network.
Overseas partnerships
In 2020 the three main facilities for the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, Scottsdale, Arizona, and Jacksonville, Florida, all in the USA, were supplemented by the first overseas outpatient centre, Mayo Clinic Healthcare, in London, UK.
The Clinic has also formed closer links with overseas partners, such as the Sheikh Shakhbout Medical City (SSMC) in Abu Dhabi, the United Arab Emirates. The SSMC is one of the UAE’s largest hospitals, established as part of the Abu Dhabi Economic Vision 2030 to elevate healthcare services in the Emirate. In 2019 the Abu Dhabi Health Services Company (SEHA), established a joint venture with the Mayo Clinic to operate the SSMC, and the partnership aims to develop the SSMC into a regional centre of excellence.
Huimei Healthcare, or HM Healthcare Management Services, is a Beijing, China, medical group established by Mayo Clinic and Hillhouse Capital in a 2015 joint venture. The company focuses on healthcare investment, management, consulting, training, and other services. Mayo Clinic contributes with its industry know-how, continuing education and training systems for specialists, doctors, and nurses.
Digital medicine
Mayo Clinic has chosen this partnership and support model to expand its healthcare provision in preference to a mergers and acquisitions strategy. The original Mayo base in Rochester, Minnesota, USA, is a small town of just 100,000 people. A strategy review on the 150th anniversary of the Clinic’s foundation decided that “Mayo’s most scalable and differentiated strength is knowledge.”
One way to leverage that is through the Mayo Care Network, whose members pay to access the educational resources and expertise of the Clinic. Another is through e-medicine and telemedicine, enabling remote support. Rochester is connected to eight intensive care units around the USA, with video and audio connection and access to patient records, providing 24/7 support. Telemedicine is widely used at Mayo to provide remote support. The Clinic has established the Mayo Clinic Center for Connected Care to resource and expand the use of digital health solutions, including real-time video telemedicine, e-consults and remote patient monitoring.
