Hospital(ity) in Healthcare
Episode 1- Series - 1
In this webinar Joshua Gan, regional director of Asia Pacific for the EHL Group, is joined by Patrik Bruhlmann, CEO & Director of the Board Pacific Healthcare Group of Companies headquartered in Thailand. This webinar is about the healthcare industry and the links between hospitality practices. Patrik describes how he embarked on his career which led him to healthcare.
Patrik Bruhlmann's Career
I think it's just when preparation meets opportunity. So, graduating from hotel School 92, I was actually supposed to work at the Mandarin or Rental in Asia in Macau, but unfortunately, my father didn't approve due to the poor pay structure. So I had to look for a salary that I could actually support myself without tapping more into the pockets of my dad. So I started to work for a textile firm in Hong Kong, then moved early on into China, also still continuing into textile, actually nonmobile textile medical textiles. And then started to work for one of the large healthcare companies called Zuli Pharma in Taiwan, in state, basically in that sector, taiwan, Thailand, Middle East, Australia, and now back to Thailand.
What does the healthcare market contribute to the global economy?
Roughly more than 5 Trillion. The numbers are big numbers, and it demonstrates that both tourism as well as healthcare are large providers of employment, and large providers in creating money for economies. I think tourism - that's hotels, restaurants, leisure and to a certain extent, travel and transportation as well - the pandemic shrank certain destinations dependant on tourist trade, such as the Maldives, Thailand, Bali, really, depending on the geography where you are. When people ask about healthcare, they say wow, business must be fabulous. Unfortunately, like hospitality, business is not that fabulous. healthcare also shrank by about 30% because a lot of people stayed away from hospitals during the pandemic because infection rates can be high in hospitals because a lot of people are sick. Pharmaceuticals counts for about 1.2 Trillion, that's about 15%. So if you look at the revenue source of a hospital, about 15% of the revenue in a hospital is generated with selling medication to patients visiting the hospital.
The link between hospitality and healthcare
I think there is an interlinked dependency, you cannot really move away from one or the other. So a patient can be compared to a hotel customer, however the stickiness of the business in a hospital is much higher. For you and I to move hotels, if you're not happy with the bed or the air conditioner or with the smile of the receptionist, we can quickly go to another hotel and have similar services. But as a patient, you are very attached to the doctor, you are very attached to how the treatment is going. You're very attached to the location, to the hospital and what your previous experience has been there. So patients don't tend to change doctors and hospitals, unless they feel they are not helped, but it's usually not the case.
