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Annual Report 2013
KPJ HEALTHCARE BERHAD
112
Business
Review
Medical Tourism
The Middle East
The Middle East region is a promising one for
KPJ, given its strong growth potential. Taking
into account the similarities in culture and
customs between Malaysia and the Middle
East, as well as our good track record in
managing hospitals in Saudi Arabia, KPJ is
strongly-positioned to attract medical tourists
from this region. In 2013, we implemented
several marketing activities abroad and locally
which helped grow our patient numbers from
the Middle East, which led to a hike in related
medical tourism revenue.
We took part in the IMTEC 2013 event in Oman
which targeted all aspects of the health and
wellness industry including health products,
services and facilities, opportunities for new
developments and trends, as well as trade and
investment. It is the rst event in Oman for the
health and medical sector and is considered
one of the biggest healthcare exhibitions in the
whole Middle East region.
The Medical Tourism team also travelled to
Dubai in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to
participate in onemajor exhibitions, namely the
Arabian Travel Market 2013 (ATM). The former
event promotes and introduces the latest
medical technology products and solutions,
and is the only international healthcare
exhibition of its kind in the UAE. There were
several enquiries from this event.
On the domestic front, we organised the
KPJ Malaysia-Arab Community Day 2013 at
Bangunan Seri Utama, Kompleks Kraf in Kuala
Lumpur. This event sought to demonstrate the
Group’s appreciation of the Arab community
who have been ardent supporters of KPJ and
an important customer segment for quite a
while now. Some 300 members of the Arab
community as well as ambassadors and high
commissioners attended the day’s celebration
together with their families and friends. This
opportune platform helped highlight the
differences and similarities between the
cultures, built goodwill, as well as strengthened
ties.
We also organised a familiarisation tour and
presentation for Oman Government delegates
to demonstrate KPJ’s Customer Service values.
A Health Day in collaboration with the Al-
Basirah School was also organised with some
370 students and 40 teachers in attendance.
East Africa
In line with our aim of extending our medical
tourism foothold, we began focusing on the
East African countries in 2013, especially
Somalia, as well as Ethiopia, Kenya, Sudan,
South Sudan, Tanzania, and the countries
around the region. In March 2013, the
Medical Tourism team travelled to Hargeisa
in Somaliland and Adis Ababa in Ethiopia for
sales visits and by the year’s end, sales visit
were made to Hargeisa and Mogadishu in
Somalia.
On the home front, we paid a visit to the new
Somali ambassador to Malaysia, H.E. Mr.
Nour Farah, to introduce the KPJ Group of
Hospitals. The activities abroad were well
matched with activities at home in Malaysia.
Visits were made to prominent Somalis,
while health screenings were undertaken
where there was a concentration of Somali
communities in Malaysia. These activities
have helped strengthen our ties with the
Somali communities many of whom now opt
for KPJ’s hospitals as their hospital of choice.
Complementary Activities
2013’s marketing and promotional efforts did
much to solidify the KPJ Group’s position
as a major healthcare player and create an
attractive patient proposition in our target
markets. We believe that a higher number
of medical tourists will be drawn in by the
attractive, competitively priced packages
for international-standard medical care that
we are offering. Going forward, we intend
to maintain the momentum of our current
marketing strategies given the positive in ux
of patients within all our target markets.
KPJ took part in the First
International Medical
Tourism Conference and
Exhibition 2013 (IMTEC)
in Oman to showcase our
services.