July 4, 2004

Curtis Page, a bilingual doctor based in Tempe, Ariz., calls his family’s recent book “a labor of love.” They spent three years researching and writing the Mexico: Health and Safety Travel Guide. Robert Page did much of the fieldwork, interviewing doctors and health-care bureaucrats throughout Mexico. His brother, Curtis, and father, also named Robert, helped choose the 180 physicians included in the book while running their bilingual family practice in Tempe. Together, the three compiled an amazingly comprehensive health guide that takes part of the worry out of travel in Mexico.

“We wanted to help all the baby boomers climbing into Winnebagos and driving from place to place in Mexico,” says Curtis Page. The book, it turns out, is as valuable for first-time Mexico vacationers as it is for those who spend months exploring the country.

The first section of the guide covers all the basic issues, including infectious diseases and chronic medical conditions. The descriptions of the symptoms of common ailments are invaluable for travelers headed anywhere, while the review of Mexico’s health-care system helps foreigners navigate the specific oddities within the country.

Regional chapters cover 40 popular vacation and retirement destinations in Mexico, recommending hospitals, clinics and physicians. The Pages created a rating system for doctors and medical facilities, helping readers zero in on their particular concerns.

Recommended doctors are profiled with photographs and background information. Most are board certified, and all were interviewed by one of the authors.

The authors are frank with their opinions on each region. They sharply criticize the corruption of Cancún’s health-care system, delineating the chain of payoffs between hotels, doctors, hospitals and ambulance drivers that drives up the cost of emergency medical care. Mérida’s facilities and physicians receive lavish praise, as do those in Guadalajara, where the senior Robert Page received his medical degree.

The Pages have developed a publishing firm and Web site called MedToGo and intend to update their specific, timely information on the Web and in a newsletter for their followers. Eventually, they’ll publish other regional and country guides, but Mexico is getting their full attention for now.

Mexico: Health and Safety Travel Guide. costs $19.95 and is available through Amazon.com and MedToGo at (866) 633-8646 (MedToGo), www.medtogo.com