Medtral has opened an office in California and is targeting Americans in search of cheap elective surgery - as little as a third of what they pay in the United States -- through Auckland-based Ascot Hospital and Clinics, The Dominion Post reported.
Ascot's owners include businesswoman Dianne Forman and The Warehouse chairman Keith Smith.
Global medical tourism, fuelled by soaring health care prices in developed countries, was worth $US60 billion ($NZ79 billion) in 2008, according to Deloitte, which predicted the market would reach $US100 billion by last year.
Medtral offers a heart bypass for $US37,000 ($NZ49,000) including flights and insurance, as little as 30 per cent of the cost of the procedure in the United States, according to the firm's promotional material.
Though Medtral could not compete with prices offered in developing countries - which have seen a boom in plastic surgery and obesity treatments in particular - it offered a similar cultural experience for Americans that was still significantly cheaper than elective surgery in the United States, it said.
Medtral hoped to attract "hundreds" of patients to New Zealand from the current "handfuls".
