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With little official marketing or promotion of Dubai, a new private website seeks to fill the gap by showcasing Dubai's healthcare resources online via a free online service Doctor-Dubai.com.

The Ministry of Health (MOH) UAE licensed portal is displaying detailed profiles of 1500 healthcare professionals from more than 280 medical facilities in Dubai to the world, attracting thousands of views every day. The portal lets doctors and companies create their profiles free of cost and display them to hundreds of thousands of visitors from across the globe, highlighting Dubai's efforts in building excellence of service and value. It charges organisations for advertising.

Doctor-Dubai.com is a next-generation website dedicated to helping the people of Dubai find local medical professionals who accept their health insurance and ideally match their requirements. With nearly one and half thousand local providers listed, it has a profile for nearly every individual licensed to practice medicine in Dubai. The site combines detailed provider data with an easy to use search interface to enable users to take the guesswork out of finding the right doctor online.

It is an easy mistake to assume that the growing number of health facilities in Dubai are just after medical tourists. Demand for healthcare services in Dubai has increased quickly over a relatively short period of time thanks to rapid population growth and an increasingly unhealthy populace that, analysts believe, will make the demand for hospital beds double by 2025. In the face of this, the UAE government has overhauled the public health infrastructure at primary, secondary and tertiary levels and there are nine major hospital projects underway at a value of $596m. Dubai has invested heavily in specialist care units for the treatment of cardiovascular diseases and cancer over the past few years as its population starts to develop the healthcare woes associated with an affluent society.
At Dubai Healthcare City (DHCC), a $1.8bn public-private partnership with the Tatweer group, houses a collection of medical teaching institutions, private hospitals and clinics, pharmaceuticals offices, research facilities, spas and rehabilitation centres. In the future, the private sector is expected to play an increasingly crucial role, with healthcare providers from around the globe eyeing the Dubai market as a potentially lucrative option, and entering into partnerships with local companies.

Layla Moufid co-founder of Doctor-Dubai.com is extremely optimistic on the potential, "Dubai is expected to be the favourite destination for most of the expected 11 million medical tourists to the UAE by 2010 and we are playing our part in establishing Dubai as the city that cares for your wellness."