The Korea surgery planning checklist

Most of what goes wrong on a surgery trip is decided before anyone picks up a scalpel: a clinic chosen from an advertisement, a quote that was never written down, a flight booked four days after an operation that swells for two weeks. The checklist is the short version of everything on this site.

What is on it

1. Before you book. How to check that a clinic is a licensed medical institution, how to check the doctor is a specialist rather than a general practitioner, and where those registers live.
2. The consultation. Nine questions, including the three that most reliably change the answer: who will perform each part of the operation, what happens if you need a revision, and what the quotation excludes.
3. In writing. The documents to leave with: an itemised quotation, the consent form in a language you read, the anaesthesia plan, and the name of the operating surgeon.
4. The calendar. Realistic ranges for how long to stay, when stitches come out, and when flying is usually cleared — so you book the return leg last.
5. If something goes wrong. Who to contact in Korea, what the medical dispute process is, and what to keep a record of.

What we do with your address

We send the checklist, and later an occasional email when a guide is updated. No clinic, agency or advertiser gets your address, ever. One click unsubscribes. See privacy.