Dr. Kevin Huffman
Medical Travel Associates
The road to Medical Travel Associates began 25 years ago when Dr. Huffman entered
a new and emerging field of medicine known as bariatrics (obesity medicine).
Dr. Huffman began his bariatric medical career as national medical director and
spokesman to over 200 commercial weight loss centers where he developed clinical
treatment protocols, created physician training and mentoring programs and
monitored a national network of physicians.
In the mid 1990s Dr. Huffman was elected to the board of director of the American
Society of Bariatric Physicians (ASBP) and served on the membership committee
where he had the opportunity to recruit and mentor physicians in the art, science and
business of bariatric medicine. As a board certified obesity physician, Dr. Huffman
was asked to help nurture the first medical certification boards for the ASBP; the
American Board of Bariatric Medicine and went on to help physician throughout the
US become board certified in bariatric medicine.
During his tenure on the ASBP board of directors Dr. Huffman was approached by
leaders of the ASMBS (American Society of Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery) asking
that he join the ASMBS and help them educate and engage primary care physicians,
employers and insurers as he did for the bariatric medical community and the ASBP.
He joined the ASMBS as its first board certified bariatric medical physician and went
on to serve on the bariatric medical committee of the ASMBS helping to formulate
perioperative treatment guidelines for bariatric surgery. Here again Dr. Huffman had
the opportunity to educate, engage and network with American primary care
physicians to help grow the emerging new field of bariatric surgery.
Through his private consulting company; American Bariatric Consultants Dr. Huffman
became a consultant to bariatric pharma and bariatric surgical device companies such
as Ethicon, Covidien, Allergan, Roche, and Abbott and spent over a decade traveling
throughout the US educating and engaging physicians to help stimulate growth in this
emerging new field of bariatrics surgery. His educational programs where designed
to engage US primary care physicians (PCPs) in the preoperative and postoperative
care of bariatric surgical patients to help reduce risk, improve outcomes and
increase patient referrals.
In the early 2000s US patients (particularly those paying cash) began to travel
domestically and internationally for bariatric surgery seeking out safe and affordable
bariatric surgical options. This ‘travel bariatric surgery’ led to a new set of
perioperative issues, namely who was going to provide acute perioperative care for a
patient that may have had surgery hundreds or even thousands of miles away from
their home? Since it would be impossible for the destination bariatric surgeon to
provide this care and very unlikely that a local bariatric surgeon would be willing to
deliver perioperative care to a patient that had surgery elsewhere, the acute
perioperative care typically fell onto the laps of the patient’s primary care physician
(PCP) who had no training in acute perioperative patient care for traveling surgical
patients.
Today’s US primary care physicians no longer provide acute perioperative patient
care as they did 20-30 years ago. In today’s healthcare environment when a patient is
to have surgery locally, the local surgical team and local hospitalist (internist
employed by the hospital to provide acute postoperative care) manage acute
perioperative patient care. Primary care physicians don’t see these surgical patients
until they are released from the care of the local surgical team and hospitalist, which
in some cases could be weeks after the surgery. When patients travel outside of their
local community however this acute perioperative patient care falls into a void, or
they end up at the office of their primary care physician as early as a day or two after
surgery expecting their PCP to provide complicated and detailed acute perioperative
care.
To help fill this void Dr. Huffman was asked by the bariatric community to develop
and deliver physician education on acute perioperative patient care for the traveling
bariatric surgical patient to help decrease risk and improve patient outcomes. Dr
Huffman developed the medical education and training system necessary to educate,
engage and support primary care physicians in the management of their traveling
bariatric surgical patients and our American Bariatric University division of
American Bariatric Consultants was awarded 5 physician education CME hours
through the ASBP based upon those educational modules.
The goal of these educational programs was to build a national network of referring
physicians who could help REDUCE PERIOPERATIVE RISK, IMPROVE LONG-TERM
OUTCOMES and INCREASE PATIENT REFERRALS for traveling bariatric surgery
patients, surgeons and hospitals.
In 2009, Dr. Huffman was approached by the leadership of the MTA (Medical Tourism
Association) who asked, if he would develop similar referring physician educational
programs for their emerging new healthcare field. He organized an aftercare
committee in 2009 for the MTA and presented his first lecture that year at the
International Medical Tourism Association’s conference on postoperative care for the
traveling surgical patient. In 2012 his preop-pre travel and postop-post travel
physician lectures were granted CME approval through the Miami-Dade Medical
Society, representing the first CME approved courses for the Medical Tourism
Association. He presented these lectures at the 2012 MTA International conference
in Miami in October of 2012. In 2013 Dr. Huffman worked with the MTA leadership
and the University of Miami, to develop and certify12 CME approved physician
education presentations through the University of Miami. Dr. Huffman deliver 6
lectures at the 6th Annual World Medical Tourism & Global Healthcare Congress held
in Las Vegas November 2-6th 2013 including several CME approved lectures for
referring physicians.
Dr. Huffman is recognized as a medical authority for this emerging new healthcare
field and is seeking out opportunities to promote Medical Tourism, Healthcare
Clusters, Facilitators, Destination Hospitals and Surgeons through his
medical/surgical travel physician education and engagement.
His goal is to create an international network of certified medical/travel referring
physician who can help reduce perioperative risk, improve long-term outcomes and
increase referrals to destination hospitals and surgeons. The Medical Tourism
industry is poised for explosive growth as healthcare becomes ‘globalized’ and
patients, insurers and employers seek out high quality, low cost healthcare options
both domestically and internationally.
Following the successful business model that he utilized with American Bariatric
Consultants and it’s educational division American Bariatric University to educate,
engage and network with referring physicians, Dr. Huffman has created a new
medical/surgical travel consulting business; Medical Travel Associates, with an
educational arm; Global Healthcare University to educate, mentor and certify PCPs
in medical/surgical travel healthcare.
The first step in the process of creating and managing an international network of
referring physicians (MTA physician network) is to educate and certify referring
physicians. The next step would be to use this network of certified physicians and the
patients they represent to create value to those in the medical tourism field
(governments, ministries of health, healthcare clusters, hospital systems, destination
physicians/surgeons and facilitators) to influence patient movement, insurance
policies and employers decisions.
If you’d like to learn more about Dr. Huffman and Medical Travel Associates please
contact him directly at 440-610-2030