A spa break might leave you feeling healthier, but does that make it medical tourism? Add a doctor, diagnostic tests and a personalised programme, and the distinction becomes harder to draw. At the Health Tourism Conference in Baku, an animated panel discussion exposed how difficult it remains to define the boundaries between treatment, prevention and wellbeing. Moderated by László Puczkó, chief executive of HTWWLife, the panel tackled a deceptively simple question: what makes wellness medical, and who should oversee it?
Is prevention separate from lifestyle?
The disagreement emerged early. Lutz Lungwitz, president of the German Medical Wellness Association, drew distinctions between medical tourism, medical wellness and wellness tourism, associating the latter with lifestyle and enjoyment.
“So you’re suggesting that prevention is not lifestyle?” Puczkó asked, challenging a separation that would become a recurring theme throughout the debate.
For Emil Hidayatli, chief physician at TABIA Group, lifestyle and prevention are closely connected. Drawing on his work in lifestyle medicine, he argued that nutrition, physical activity and natural resources can form part of a medically supervised approach to preventing disease.
The distinction, in his view, lies partly in professional involvement. Medical wellness introduces medical assessment, consultations and personalised programmes into an experience that extends beyond general relaxation. Follow-up matters too: the ambition should be to support changes that continue after guests return home.
Yet this raised another question. If both wellness and medical wellness encourage healthier habits, how clearly can travellers distinguish between them?
Traditional spa destinations face a changing market
For Kateřina Adámková, director of Císařské lázně in Karlovy Vary, these questions have immediate commercial relevance. She described the challenge facing Czech spa destinations built around traditional treatment stays lasting two or three weeks.
Such lengthy visits are increasingly difficult to fit into people’s lives. Adámková also highlighted the loss of Russian guests and the pressure on destinations to attract different markets, including visitors interested in shorter medical wellness stays.
Thomas Bömkes, medical and health tourism adviser to ITB Berlin, argued that reaching younger generations requires a broader approach. Nutrition, cooking lessons, mental wellbeing and sleep could all help guests connect their stay with changes they can make at home.
The value of a visit, he suggested, extends beyond the days spent at the destination. Giving people something useful to take back into everyday life could also encourage them to return.
Must the benefits be measurable?
Puczkó pressed the panel to explain what visitors should expect to gain. Medical treatment often has an identifiable outcome, such as a new hip or a repaired tooth. What, he asked, is the equivalent promise in medical wellness?
“What’s the reason to believe?”
Hidayatli cautioned against promising rapid results. Some changes could be assessed during a stay, he argued, but medical wellness should focus on longer-term outcomes, supported by continued adherence and follow-up.
Puczkó challenged whether that proposition would persuade younger consumers looking for visible results. Hidayatli suggested that activity tracking and other tools could help guests monitor their progress after leaving.
Bömkes offered a different perspective, describing a two-week Ayurveda experience in India. Changes to his diet, daily treatments and restful sleep had left him feeling sufficiently better to want to repeat the experience annually.
“I don’t need figures. I don’t care. I felt it was good to me,” he said.
For Bömkes, that personal response also had marketing value: a satisfied visitor returns home and recommends the experience to friends. His example illustrated the appeal of wellness travel, while leaving open the moderator’s question about what makes its benefits specifically medical.
Who should set the rules?
The discussion became more concrete when it turned to regulation. If a service uses the word “medical”, what qualifications, supervision and safeguards should travellers expect?
Hidayatli supported certification involving cooperation between relevant authorities. Bömkes argued for government regulation of health-related activities, while allowing other bodies to oversee aspects outside that remit.
Lungwitz described his association’s work on an independent certification system combining medical involvement with hospitality standards. He also questioned whether “tourism” adequately describes a journey made specifically to receive medical treatment.
Across these different positions, trust emerged as a shared concern. Travellers need to understand what they are buying, who is responsible for their care and what claims a provider can reasonably make.
Tourist, patient or client?
Ultimately, the distinction depends on who the offer is designed for: a tourist seeking relaxation and wellbeing, a patient travelling for medical care, or a client investing in a personalised programme to improve their health.
Their motivations and expectations shape the services they need, the outcomes they seek and the level of medical supervision required. For destinations, identifying that audience is the starting point for defining a credible offer.
