WHY PLANETHOSPITAL?

At PlanetHospital, we believe in borderless medicine and patient empowerment. The borders of medicine are not just geographical, but financial, political, and syndicated. A patient should have the freedom to choose where they get their healthcare whether it is across state lines or across the globe. A patient should be able to afford healthcare without having to scale the walls of financial opaqueness of a cabalistic healthcare industrial complex. A patient should have access to the best surgeons in the world without being limited by travel regulations. A patient should have the right to the latest innovations in medicine without being constrained by regulations that might exist to prevent competition rather than harm. A patient should be able to receive healthcare in a timely manner rather than be limited by rationing. A patient should be able to get news about healthcare practices and pricing transparently and pay a fair price instead of being subjugated by a chargemaster. Why is it that it is easy to find the price of a thermonuclear reactor on the internet than it is to find the cost of gallbladder surgery in the US? This is the reason PlanetHospital exists. While we may make our income as being the admissions desk to some of the finest surgeons in the world, our passion is driven by our desire to break down the boundaries of heathcare.

Patients are not the only ones facing healthcare borders. Surgeons should be able to have the freedom of providing innovative medical solutions without fear of malpractice persecution that forces them to become proponents of defensive medicine. Surgeons should be able to provide quality care and attention and expect fair compensation for doing so without breaching imposed upon sanctions.
PlanetHospital has gathered some of the best surgeons from around the world for some, and around the corner for others. We will provide you with transparent pricing, immediate access to some of the finest surgeons in the world, the ability to contact and communicate with medical professionals immediately, and information on the latest medical procedures for various conditions and we will do this safely and affordably. In a transparent, borderless healthcare environment, patients and surgeons will thrive, and ultimately the money will follow the patient. And that is why PlanetHospital exists.
PlanetHospital, we are A New Way To Care.

WHAT IS PLANETHOSPITAL

PlanetHospital is a medical tourism portal that allows you to find a surgeon that is affordable, that is available immediately to assist you, or provides medical care which you might not normally have access to. You simply select a procedure, choose a surgeon, upload medical records, and then book the surgery all from your computer or smartphone. You can also book flights, hotels, and other services with PlanetHospital as well. The prices on the PlanetHospital website are set by the surgeons or hospitals themselves so there are no medical tourism facilitators taking advantage of you.

Why Use PlanetHospital

While others claim to be the first company to be in the medical tourism industry or the leaders, PlanetHospital started in 2002, and our membership with the Better Business Bureau bears this out. We have been a Better Business Bureau Member since 2002, with a total of 7 complaints since 2002 (even though our Better Business Bureau profile only shows 3), with a consistent A Rating since 2002. But there are even better reasons to consider us.

We are NOT a Medical Tourism Facilitator

PlanetHospital is a medical tourism portal. The prices on our website are set by the surgeons or hospitals, you choose the surgeons, and you book the surgeries, hotels, etc. all from one convenient location. A medical tourism facilitator offers no value to you except to mark up the cost of your surgery. PlanetHospital does offer in-house physicians to answer any questions you may have and case managers to help you along with the process when you need it. We also have an in-house travel desk to assist you with travel requirements if required. PlanetHospital also offers follow up care for you post surgery.

Strength In Numbers

PlanetHospital has helped over 5000+ persons with their medical tourism needs without any major complications. This was not achieved because we are lucky but because we are smart. Smart enough to choose the right surgeons and facilities; smart enough to check out each and every facility we send our patients to.

Hospitals and doctors throughout the globe appreciate our attention and focus on client safety. With that in mind, picture yourself in a confrontational or complication situation.

If you were a PlanetHospital client, we can remind the hospital and doctors just how many patients we have brought to their hospital and they be more inclined to resolve a matter with you fairly rather than lose their relationship with us. If you booked the procedure yourself, you would not have this leverage?

Trusted Experience

• PlanetHospital began in 2002, back when the concept of traveling to another country for medical care was well, foreign. When one typed the words medical tourism, they would find Planethospital (and a rather dreadful website) and some outfit in Iran. While pioneers get the arrows being an early starter had its advantages. We made a lot of our mistakes early while the rest are trying to figure things out. Today when you type in the words "medical tourism" several pages of results will come up because it is such a hot�� space to be in but we find it reckless and irresponsible to enter this business without any solid understanding of the fundamentals. After all, this is your health we are talking about and neither you or PlanetHosptial can afford to be reckless.
• Better Business Bureau and Trustlink
  
  At the expense of sounding smug, we are the only medical tourism company to have been with the Better Business Bureau since 2002. We have had less than seven complaints since 2002 and all were resolved, and we have had an A+ rating since 2002. Not an easy task for a healthcare company. Hopefully it reflects the fact that we not only love what we do, we are quite good at it and we possess a strong sense of integrity and fairness. Yes, we have had our share of unhappy and disgruntled clients, but for the most part we feel we have done an excellent job and our BBB rating is a proud reflection of this achievement. Please view our BBB and Truslink Reviews by clicking here.
  
  We have received a few bad reviews on the internet too however, to those who wish to give them any credence we encourage you to read this:
  
  Planet Hospital is committed to providing intended parents the means to create the family of their dreams at an affordable price. As a father and husband, I understand how important it is for our clients to feel that their future as a family is in trustworthy hands.
  
  Posting an accusation on the Internet is simple. Refuting it is more difficult. In many cases a bribe is required to remove information. I appreciate your patience in allowing me to do so.
  
  In some of the postings, I am accused on misappropriating funds. As common sense will tell you, this is a serious accusation. If this were the truth, you would not be reading this post as I would be facing federal indictment. Clearly, that is not the case.
  
  When I founded Planet Hospital, eleven years ago, I saw an opportunity to help people access care that might otherwise be out of their reach. I started this business with a vision and have had to build the infrastructure to make that dream a reality. Along the way, I've worked hard and have learned a lot. I have had the good fortune to assemble a solid team of dedicated professionals here in the United States and abroad. I am proud of them and all that we have accomplished.
  
  Building a completely new way of accessing health care was not an easy task. Along the way, we had to learn some hard lessons. There are clinics we trusted and vendors we worked with in the beginning that did not serve us or our clients well. I had to learn the hard way that not all of my employees were as committed to our mission as I am.
  
  Learning those lessons was painful for me personally and professionally, but I am grateful for them. I am not ashamed of standing up to a clinic using an under qualified person for a job that demands excellence, even though doing so has resulted in my being slandered. (For more information about this, please visit www.kiranclinic.com)
  
  When a client has brought a concern to my attention, I have and will continue to do my best to resolve it. My record at the Better Business Bureau (http://www.la.bbb.org/business-reviews/ Medical-Service-Organizations/PlanetHospital-in-Calabasas-CA-13182337) and trust link (http:// trustlink.org/Reviews/PlanetHospital-205844252) demonstrates that commitment.
  
  I cannot control the actions of a couple of malicious individuals. If a person does not support international surrogacy as an affordable option for building a family, traditional or otherwise, I can't change their minds. If someone is swayed more by gossip than facts, (see our lexisnexis report and you will see that we have not ever been sued or investigated: https:// law.lexisnexis.com/infopro/zimmermans/disp.aspx?z=1313) then I can't help them.
  
  What we at Planet Hospital, and our partners around the world, can and will do is to strive towards making our surrogacy clients know that we understand that surrogacy is a miraculous journey, but isn't always an easy one. We are committed to making each step as understandable, stress free and joyful as possible.
  
  The logistics of coordinating medical care on three continents are complex. As much as we would like them to, sometimes things don't go don't always go smoothly. What makes Planet Hospital different than some of our competition is that we don't run away if things get tough and we don't bully our critics into silence.
  
  As a father, I have taught my daughter to pursue her dreams. I am proud to say that she is making that happen. I am determined to make her as proud of her old man as I am of her, which is why I have and will continue confront this head on.
  
  Are we perfect? Absolutely not! In 11 years of business in the health industry we will upset some people, BUT it is how we treat the problems and complaints that I feel we should be judged by. If you go to the Better Business Bureau, the Chamber of Commerce or Trustlink you will see LEGITIMATE COMPLAINTS and how we handled each and every one of them.
  
  PlanetHospital is leading a charge to help prevent cyber-smearing by ANONYMOUS posters. We understand that some of you might think this is wrong and it takes away freedom of speech. However see it for a moment from the point of view of a small business for a moment. If your business was vandalized and the word 'NAZI' was carved into the front door, then friends and passersby would probably conclude that you were victims of a hate crime or a smear campaign and offer sympathy in your favor. However if someone created a page on the internet in which they called you a Nazi then a lot of people might conclude that you just might be and there is very little that you can do about it.
• Thought Leader
  Rudy Rupak, our founder, has become the industry thought leader in Medical Tourism. From speaking at the house of representatives in West Virginia and Colorado to presenting a paper to the Senate committee on aging, to being invited as a thought leader at the World Health Executive Forum (the Davos of healthcare), and speaking at several engagements such as ABQUARP and AHIP and more. Rudy has been a visionary that most employers, insurance companies, and government agencies that people consult (free of charge by the way) to understand which way the industry is going. Rudy's concepts such as Best Of Both Worlds and Diaspora are examples of his innovations that are a testament to his leadership role in the industry of medical tourism.

• Media (Nightline, Time Magazine, Fox and all major networks)

  PlanetHospital has more publicity and exposure than any other medical tourism company from media giants like, Time Magazine, Nightline, GoodHousekeping and more. Visit our PRESS section and learn more. With media comes greater scrutiny and so we strive to maintain our integrity and professionalism rather than let it turn to hubris.

• Concierge Services and dedicated travel desk

  One of the main values of our service is our in country support (the concierge). When you book your trip with PlanetHospital you not only receive excellent customer service and support while you are home, but you have a real, live, person who lives near the hospital you are going to and is there to help you during your stay. Some of the duties of the concierge are as follows:
  
  - Contact client prior to arrival to discuss the country they are visiting
  - Arrange pick up from airport (and special transport if required)
  - Meet client at the hospitals, take care of client's companion
  - Intervene in the event of any dispute with hospital
  - Contact family members in case of emergency and arrange their transport
  - Arrange for aftercare while in country
  - Arrange to drop off at airport
  - Liaise between the countries and Planet Hospital
  - Shopping and site-seeing arrangements can be made as needed for additional fees.
  - Maximum of 10 hours of transportation services over and above the hotel/airport transfers (additional hours can be negotiated between you and your concierge).
  
  We take every step possible to ensure that something does NOT go wrong during your stay. If you booked your airfare through Planet Hospital, we are able to change the ticket without any penalties or change fees.

Our Fees and Process

We provide 100% refund less any medical services rendered
PlanetHospital charges what the hospitals charge. You simple choose the surgeon, and pay their invoice through our convenient payment gateway and that?s it. You can also pay for flights and hotels from our site as well. Now we do offer additional services such as, retrieving medical records, our raved about concierge service and follow up care (for US patients currently), and, in some cases, insurance.

When you call PlanetHospital you have the option of speaking to an in-house physician who can answer your questions about overseas medical care and provide you with some information about the procedure you are contemplating. We have a comprehensive database of which hospitals are not well equipped to handle certain allergies (such as latex), which countries have low rare blood supplies, and which countries you should not fly to if you have certain health risks. This is done by having you fill out a Confidential Medical Questionnaire (CMQ), very similar to the one you would fill out at a doctor's office.

Depending on the type of procedures you are seeking, our medical professional will also ask you to send any medical data that you may have such as x-rays, EKGs, MRIs etc. You can either scan and upload them or send them to us to upload and scan for only $20 for return postage (or a self addresses stamped envelope). We can also help you obtain your medical records for a nominal fee of only $200.

After you book your surgery, you are directed to the PlanetHospital travel desk where you can book flights, hotels, as well as your passports and visas if needed. Your Country Manager will also be in touch with you to discuss your airport pick up and to see if you would be interested in the concierge service.

The concierge service is typically $100/day for the first three days and then $75/day thereafter and includes the following:

- Contact client prior to arrival to discuss the country they are visiting
- Pick up from airport (and special transport if required) and drop off
- Transportation to and from hotel and hospital
- Meet client at the hospitals, take care of client's companion
- Intervene in the event of any dispute with hospital
- Contact family members in case of emergency and arrange their transport
- Arrange for aftercare while in country
- Arrange to drop off at airport
- Shopping and site-seeing arrangements can be made as needed for additional fees.

And when you are back, your case manager will contact you to discuss if you need any after care follow up and will help arrange this for you as well.

SAFETY

Keeping you safe

Medical tourism, medical travel, going abroad for healthcare, or whatever you want to call it, does have risks associated with it.
What if something goes wrong? Is it a safe place? What about my allergies? At PlanetHospital, we hear these kinds of questions everyday and we are confidently prepared to deal with them them. That is the PlanetHospital difference. Going overseas for a medical treatment is always a big step, and Planet Hospital knows that your concerns over safety plays a great part in making that decision. PlanetHospital provides information about your potential medical care providers online, you can review everything to your heart's content, look at other patient's reviews, and even communicate with the potential surgeon or hospital.

When you contact us, you ca ask to speak to a friendly in-house doctor to answer your questions instead of a salesperson. Most facilitators want to hustle you through a process without taking your safety into consideration. This is not how PlanetHospital values its potential patients.

It all starts with the surgeons.

At PlanetHospital, We provide you with a choice of many surgeons, all of whom we have met and researched. At PlanetHospital, we believe it is the doctor first then the hospital. Logically speaking, it is the doctor that makes you well, not the hospital. We find the most appropriate surgeons for each specialty from around the globe, not the cheapest. We are also looking for hard-to-find treatments and bring them to the people who need them. We have met with each and every doctor in our network and we have determined whom we will recommend based on a variety of factors that include:

Education:
Residency:
Additional training
Proficient in English and other languages
Years of experience
Peer review
Patient Review.

(there is more but we will let our competitors copy the above for now)

We want doctors that are concerned with your safety and have an innovative approach instead of practicing defensive medicine. The surgeons in our network review your medical history and are willing to have an email or phone consult with you as well if required. This does not necessarily mean you will get the cheapest doctor but you will certainly get one of the finest surgeons in the world.

IT IS OUR POLICY NOT TO PROVIDE A FINAL ESTIMATE OR GUESSTIMATE UNTIL YOU HAVE FILLED OUT YOUR MEDICAL FORMS AND SENT YOUR MEDICAL RECORDS/IMAGES IF REQUIRED. WE ARE NOT DOING THIS TO BE MEAN BUT BECAUSE WE CARE ENOUGH TO MAKE YOU A GOOD PATIENT.

The Confidential Medical Questionnaire (CMQ):

The Confidential Medical Questionnaire Form is similar to the form you would fill out in a doctor's office along with additional data that will not only help us determine if you will be suitable for surgery abroad but also help our surgeon network get a better health history of you and it might also help us narrow down the right destination for you. For example, if you had latex allergies would you know which hospitals are not equipped to handle you? What about the blood supply of a rare blood type? We certainly do.

Each CMQ is customized for the type of procedure you are looking for so that our surgeons can easily assess what they are looking for. All of this is done discreetly and your privacy is vigorously maintained. The CMQ was created with guidelines from the following organisations:

Center for Disease Control (www.cdc.com) to check if the countries we want to send you to do not have any epidemics, pandemics or other environmental matters that might impact on your health.

The American Society for Aneasthesia (www.asa.org) constantly getting updates from our team with the latest list of conditions or medications that may interfere with your surgery. The conditions, contra-indications and aneasthesia are all cross-referenced to your form.

The Joint Commission for Accreditation for Healthcare Organizations (www.JCAHO.ORG) reviews hospitals and also educate all medical professionals about the latest medical technologies and the best practices.

The American Society Of Plastic Surgeons (www.asps.org) keeps us informed about the latest procedures for various plastic and cosmetic surgeries, including safety guidelines.

The American Society for Aerospace Medicine (www.asma.org) publishes guidelines about the determination and maintenance of the health, safety, and performance of patients who travel by plane. We follow their guidelines very strictly.

Feel free to visit these sites on your own but know that our doctors and nurses update themselves on any changes to the above on a quarterly basis (and we also get urgent updates).

We know that there are no bargains when it comes to healthcare, and we are not looking to send you to the absolute cheapest hospital possible. We would rather send you to a surgeon whom we have thoroughly researched and who happens to be affordable because they are overseas or in another state.

We look forward to assisting you affordably... and above all, safely.

Read this excerpt from Good Housekeeping (Oct 2007) to better understand our commitment to safety:

When Things Go Wrong For all the patients who offer rave reviews, bad outcomes can and do happen. Jude Jarvis, a 35-year-old mother of three from Scituate, RI, was five-foot-four, 185 pounds, and unhappy about her body. In 2006, she told her sister Elizabeth Wright that she wanted a tummy tuck and a breast reduction, but that she didn't have the $20,000 it would cost. When Wright, who had just heard about a 60 Minutes segment on medical tourism, told her about the overseas option, Jarvis set off to learn more.

One call she made was to Rudy Rupak, founder of Planet Hospital. Rupak says Jarvis told him she wanted not only the stomach and breast work, but also liposuction, a face-lift, and an arm-thinning brachioplasty. Rupak gave her four options: Costa Rica, Panama, Thailand, and India, which was the least expensive. Jarvis chose India.

But she didn't get much further with Planet Hospital. Learning that Jarvis's body mass index was almost 32, Rupak explained that the long flight to India was a bad idea. Air travel increases the risk of deep-vein thrombosis and pulmonary embolism in its various forms (usually a blood clot in the lung), so if a patient's BMI is 29 or higher, Planet Hospital recommends a country that can be reached in less than eight hours. "We truly felt that her weight made it unsafe for her to have so many surgeries and then travel for so long," says Rupak. He also suggested she have the operations in two stages, and in a nearby country like Costa Rica or Panama, even though hospitals there would charge a bit more. "She was very angry and told a Planet Hospital associate that we were only out for the money. That was the last we heard from her," Rupak says.

Jarvis ended up booking her surgery directly with Wockhardt Hospitals, Mumbai. On May 6, 2006, she flew alone to India. Surgery was performed on May 9 by Narendra Pandya, M.D., the same doctor Planet Hospital would have suggested. Four days later, Jarvis died in the hospital from a pulmonary embolism.

Robin Kinney is well aware of this issue. Last November, the 43-year-old tore her anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) playing softball. "I was in terrible pain and couldn't walk," says Kinney, the former manager of a nonprofit company, who is currently single, unemployed, and uninsured. "I called six doctors and explained that I would pay cash up front. But only one agreed to see me." And that doctor refused to provide follow-up care.

A desperate Internet search led Kinney to the booking agency Planet Hospital, and seven days later she was on an operating table at Max Super Specialty Hospital in New Delhi. Although she was scheduled to go back to the United States nine days after the surgery, her doctor recommended she stay off the plane for another five days. But the travel agent wouldn't let her change the ticket. So Kinney boarded her flight on crutches, with her knee in a splint. During the first leg of the trip, she begged the Lufthansa flight attendant to give her one of the many empty seats in business class so she could elevate her knee, but the answer was no. On the second leg, she did snag a first-class seat, but by then had spent hours in terrible pain.

Physical therapy is essential after ACL reconstruction, and once home, Kinney needed help fast. But none of the physical therapists she found in the phone book would take foreign medical orders. Eventually, she called Planet Hospital, which arranged for a U.S. doctor to write Kinney the necessary prescription.

"As far as the technique used to operate on her leg, I wouldn't say it was any better or worse than what I see from the best orthopedic surgeons in St. Louis," says Mark Smith, P.T., A.T.C., the physical therapist who eventually worked with Kinney. "The negative is that she didn't get immediate physical therapy, which is very important to prevent scar tissue from forming. So healing took her about three months longer than it should have." Ten months after surgery, Kinney can now extend her leg without feeling pain. "The care over there is great," she says. "It's coming home that's the problem."

Planet Hospital was quick to address Kinney's issues, both by firing the unhelpful travel agency and by making sure she got the PT prescription she needed. But problems like follow-up care speak to the uncharted aspect of medical tourism, an industry in which the supposed authorities, the booking agencies, have been in business only four or five years at most. Though they often revise company practices to improve service and patient safety (for example, it's now Planet Hospital policy that clients can always change their tickets), companies are still learning on the job.

As you can see safety is a major concern for PlanetHospital. Without proper safety considerations, we would never exist.

OUR HISTORY

PlanetHospital is a love story. It all started as a complete accident in September 2002 when I took my then fiancee (whom I describe as a professional patient on account of the fact that she has had lupus for over 33 years and has had the distinct pleasure of visiting several hospitals, clinics and physicians during all that time) and also because she does not want to be identified), was visiting Bangkok with me. During our visit she had a painful lupus flare (her joints basically locked) yet she refused to go to a hospital in Bangkok. Why? Well, flashback nine months before that (Jan 2002), the same problem happened back home in Los Angeles and I took her to a beautiful university hospital where she contracted MRSA (a hospital based infection) from which she suffered for over 3 weeks. Now after getting sick in Bangkok she figured "if I can get MRSA in Beverly Hills, imagine what exciting new disease I might catch in Bangkok!"

Now I didn't want her to suffer (nor did I want her to use the expensive mini-bar as medication) so I coaxed her to visit this nice hospital I had heard of. When we arrived, we were both amazed by how magnificent the hospital looked -- almost like a 5 star hotel but with a lot of nurses. She asked the receptionist in the spartan all marble reception area if they had heard of lupus and they gave her a puzzled look that suggested "well, we are a hospital."

Within minutes we were in a private room that looked like it was reserved for VIPs (I had insurance so I was not worried by this but I was puzzled that they never did a wallet biopsy -- you know, to see if we can afford it or not so that there would be no embarrassment at discharge). Within twenty minutes we were visited by an Australian trained Thai physician who was able to diagnose my fiancee's situation properly and accurately and my fiancee was very impressed by her knowledge and her approach. The MD ordered some tests and then proceeded with her treatment. After she was done, she gave my fiancee HER MOBILE NUMBER(!) and told her quite frankly, "Call me if you need to talk to me or if you are not feeling better within two hours" (what doctor in the US or Canada would ever give their patients their cell #?). Nurses came to routinely check on us and we were assigned our OWN PERSONAL NURSE. When we pushed a call button, the nurses showed up PROMPTLY; they did not waddle in after a while; they were literally there within minutes. We were so bored of our FLAT SCREEN TV (and we are talking 2002 here when a 21 inch flat screen was about $2,000) that we would call for a nurse and time her to see how long it would take -- always under 90 seconds, incredible!

A few hours later, a CHEF (not a hospital nutritionist but a 3-star michelin award winning CHEF!) came by our room and discussed tasty low sodium menu options with her and took her dinner and breakfast order. Let me pause for a moment to say, that we are both Joe Nobodies, this celebrity treatment was not because I was kind of a big deal around Bangkok or friends with the big man or something, it was apparently what all patients received at this awesome hospital. I stayed in the room with my sweetie and the nurses prepared a bed for me.

The next day, the physician came back to make sure she was doing fine (she was and she told her she had never felt this good after a lupus attack before). Well, it was time to check out (er, be discharged) and I was expecting a crazy bill (our deductible was $500 and our insurance would cover the rest). To my shock the entire bill was $411.00 (15,000THB at the time). I thought there was a decimal missing. And so our insurance company was spared a claim and my fiancee got to enjoy Bangkok pain free.

Once she returned home, she told others about her amazing experience and some of the people in her lupus support group wanted to go to this hospital. So we ended up escorting 6 people from our locality to visit the hospitals in Bangkok with us when my fiancee and I returned, and that's how PlanetHospital was born.

As of December 2010, we have helped over 5000 people receive medical care in over 10 countries around the world. While my colleagues and I no longer personally escort our patients like we used to in the earlier years, our concierges do a much more superior job. They meet our patients at the airport, and take care of them from the moment the land to the moment they leave.

While the words medical tourism didn't exist when we first started, today this is become a rather interesting industry where anyone with a Blackberry and a basement can put up a website and call themselves medical tourism company. PlanetHospital has REAL offices in Calabasas California (home of Kim Kardashian, Britney Spears, Howie Mandel, Jessica Simpson, and others) with REAL full-time employees in those offices. We have an A+ Rating with the Better Business Bureau since 2002 with zero unresolved complaints. While I can't claim every single one of our medical tourists were thoroughly satisfied with their experience, a great majority have been because of the tremendous amount of referrals we receive. Those who've experienced our service know that we go out of our way to make sure our clients are thoroughly happy. Planehospital is more than a business to me, it's like a tribute to my fiancee, remember how i said it was a love story, now you get it. Because of her condition she cannot work, but because of her condition this incredible company was born so it is genuinely a part of her and I continue to honour that (thank you honey, from your illness, over 5000 people have been able to get well, feel or look better, have children, and more.

Rudy Rupak, Founder of PlanetHospital