How We Score Medical Tourism Destinations

Every country ranking on Epidaurus rests on a structured, repeatable research methodology — not a single expert's opinion, not a survey, and not a sponsored ranking. Understanding how we score is the first step to using our data well.

Our framework is organized into eight categories: Therapeutic Interventions, Diagnostic Services, Reproductive Services, Aesthetic & Cosmetic, Mental Health & Addiction, Alternative & Complementary Medicine, Wellness & Preventive Care, and End-of-Life Services. Within those categories we track 112 distinct factors — things like "availability of cardiac catheterization," "IVF success rate transparency," "dental implant cost relative to quality," or "legal status of assisted dying." Each factor gets its own dedicated research report for every country we cover.

Each factor report is produced by an AI research agent that performs autonomous web searches across official health ministry sources, JCI accreditation registries, academic literature, patient advocacy publications, and reputable international media. The agent is instructed to cite every material claim, and each report goes through a citation-density gate before it is accepted into the database. Reports that are too short or too thinly sourced are rejected and regenerated.

Once a research report exists, a separate scoring pass converts the qualitative findings into a 1–5 score. The rubric is defined per factor: a 5 on "cardiac surgery availability" means world-class facilities with internationally trained surgeons, transparent outcome data, and no meaningful access barriers for foreign patients. A 1 means the procedure is effectively unavailable or legally prohibited. Each score is accompanied by a brief justification and references back to the underlying evidence.

Country scores within a category are averaged to produce the category-level score visible on the world map. The overall country score is a weighted average of category scores, with therapeutic interventions weighted more heavily than wellness or alternative medicine, reflecting their relative stakes for most medical tourists. These weights are published in our methodology page so you can apply your own.

One important caveat: our research has a coverage cutoff, and medical tourism landscapes change. Regulations shift, new hospitals earn accreditation, and costs fluctuate. We update our research on a rolling basis and stamp each report with its research date. If you spot outdated information, use the feedback link on any country profile — we take those reports seriously.