Some 83,000 Dutch patients travel to Belgium, Luxembourg or Germany for treatment every year, according to research by the Benelux Unie, an organisation representing the three Benelux countries.

By contrast, just 9,400 Belgians and 4,300 Germans come to the Netherlands for treatment, the research showed.

Many patients opt for treatment abroad because of the better price-quality ratio and shorter waiting lists, the report said.

‘In Germany I could choose when to go, I was treated as a person not a number and I could stay a full week in hospital, not be sent home the next day,’ one patient told DutchNews.nl.

The Benelux Unie recommends that specialist medical provision should be dealt with on a more regional basis. It also says patients should be given more information about the option of treatment abroad.