China's leading online medical service platform, Chunyu Doctor, launched an e-commerce website on Tuesday in Beijing that links patients with international medical services and well-known overseas facilities.
The new platform, CYCARES, is geared toward providing affordable care for a wide range of Chinese citizens, from cancer screening in Japan to hip joint replacement surgery in Thailand.
"In recent years, more and more Chinese super stars and rich businessmen have paid generously to have the best medical services in other countries. So I have been considering how overseas medical services can be affordable for most of the middle class in general," said Joyce Xiong, CEO of CYCARES.
The goal of the platform is to build connections with the best medical institutions worldwide, while eliminating unnecessary services that are usually bundled in medical service packages — such as five-star hotels — which are irrelevant to the service itself, but sharply increase the costs, Xiong said.
"The Internet has been changing our lives in a way that is good at solving problems caused by a disequilibrium of resources. And in terms of the healthcare industry, the resources are very unevenly distributed. That is why we can use Internet as a tool to balance the resources," said Zhang Rui, founder of Chunyu Doctor.
To develop its International services, the company established connections with some of the world's elite medical institutions including three in the United States — Stanford University Medical Center, Johns Hopkins Hospital and UCLA Medical Center.
Zhang Yang, vice-president of the Chinese Non-government Medical Institutions Association, applauded the effort.
"The nature of healthcare is to improve people's quality of life, which never had borders," Zhang Yang said. "As a result, I am happy to see the establishment of this new platform as a demonstration for medical treatment without borders."
