SEOUL: The number of foreign medical tourists coming to South Korea topped two million last year amid growing global interest in the country’s medical services, a report shows.
A total of 2.01 million foreigners visited South Korea for medical, dental and surgical care in 2025, up 71.9% from a year earlier, according to an annual report by the state-run Korea Health Industry Development Institute.
By country, 618,000, or 30.8%, were from China, followed by 600,000 from Japan, 185,000 from Taiwan and 173,000 from the United States.
Among dermatology clinics, 459,000 Chinese patients received treatment, followed by 399,000 Japanese patients.
At plastic surgery clinics, 97,000 Japanese patients received treatment, followed by 57,000 Chinese patients.
Meanwhile, separate data by the Korea Tourism Organisation showed that foreign medical tourists spent 213.08 billion won (US$154.35mil) in July, up 66.5% from a year earlier.
The monthly figure remained above 200 billion won for five straight months from March through July.
By country, Chinese visitors spent 57.7 billion won, followed by Americans with 44 billion won and Japanese with 28.5 billion won. By type of establishment, 54.9% of foreign medical tourists’ spending was at dermatology clinics, followed by plastic surgery clinics at 19.3% and pharmacies at 12.9%. By region, foreign medical tourists spent 86.8% of their total spending in Seoul, followed by Busan at 6.4% and Gyeonggi province at 3.7%.
“This is the result of the growing perception that South Korea’s medical technology is world-class, combined with the fact that major hospitals and clinics have established multilingual guidance systems and improved the convenience of treatment,” Yoon Ji-hwan, a professor at Kyung Hee University, said. — The Korea Herald/ANN
