How to Check a Turkish Clinic or Hospital Before You Pay a Deposit

1. Find the licensed facility behind the brand

A clinic brand is not the same thing as the licensed facility. The licence is held by a named facility at an address, and the brand may be only the name on the website. Ask which legal entity you would contract with and which licensed facility and address would treat you.

The promotion regulation, Art. 8(1)(f), requires the name and web address used in promotion to match the title on the facility's licence. If the site name and the name on the certificate do not match, ask why.^[3]

2. Check the Ministry authorisation list

A facility that treats international patients needs a health tourism authorisation from the Ministry of Health. The Ministry publishes lists of authorised facilities (hospitals, medical centres, practices and other facilities) and, separately, of intermediary agencies. Search the list for the facility's official name and address, not only the brand.^[1]

Names on the list often differ from brand names: a university may appear instead of its hospital, and a branch may be listed as a medical centre. The lists print no certificate number or date. Authorised facilities must also publish the certificate on their website (promotion regulation, Art. 8(1)(b)), so ask for it and compare its name with the list.^[3]

We have done this reading for the providers in our guides; the link below shows the result for every building.

• Authorisation status of every hospital building and clinic we cover

3. Check accreditation by building

Accreditation belongs to a building, not to a group. Ask for the certificate of the building you would be in, then look for it in the accreditor's own register.^[5]

From 31 December 2026 authorised facilities need accreditation from TÜSKA, Türkiye's own accreditation institute (regulation Art. 6(1)(b), Provisional Art. 1(3)). A TÜSKA register entry is therefore worth asking for in addition to JCI, which is voluntary.^[2][6]

• JCI accreditation by Istanbul hospital building

4. Check who will treat you, and their specialty

Ask for the name of the surgeon who will operate, their specialty diploma, and whether that specialty covers your procedure. Make sure the name on the diploma is the name on your consent form and invoice.

• How to verify a surgeon's qualifications
• Who performs hair transplants at Istanbul clinics

5. Check complication insurance

Whether you are covered for complications depends on the facility, so ask for it in writing.

Article 6(1)(c) of the International Health Tourism Regulation makes it mandatory for the health facility, not the intermediary agency, to take out complication insurance for surgical and interventional procedures performed in an operating-room setting within international health tourism. The regulation text states no amount, no minimum terms and no insurer requirements.^[2]

Provisional Article 1(2) set 31 December 2025 for this. The Turkish Medical Association reports that the Council of State (Danıştay 10th Chamber) suspended execution of the complication insurance requirement on 25 December 2025.^[7] Lexpera's consolidated text of the regulation, a secondary source, notes the same suspension but ties it to the words “komplikasyon ve” in Article 6(3) and Provisional Article 1(2). We have not read the court decision, so we cannot say which provisions it covers or whether it still applies.

Article 6(3) says the facility and the intermediary are responsible for complications. What to do in practice: ask in writing whether you are covered for complications, and under which policy.

6. If an agency is involved, check it too

An agency arranging your treatment must be authorised as an intermediary, which is a separate authorisation from the facility's. Check it on the Ministry's intermediary list, and ask the agency to name the facility, and the surgeon, in writing before you pay (promotion regulation, Art. 8(1)(ğ)).^[4][3]

7. Get the quote in writing before the deposit

Before you pay anything, ask for one written quote that says what is included and what is not, the deposit amount and what is refundable, what happens if you change the date or the procedure, and who does what: the surgeon, the coordinator, the hotel and transfers, and follow-up after you fly home.

If you send us a quote, we will read it against the checklist below and tell you what is missing. We do not rank or recommend providers.

Already have a quote? We'll tell you what's missing, in writing.

Sources

Every register and professional body this guide relies on, so that the figures above can be checked at the organisation that publishes them rather than taken from us.

• 1.
  T.C. Sağlık Bakanlığı, Sağlık Turizmi Daire Başkanlığı — authorised facilities and intermediary agencies

  Official register

  The Ministry's own index of who holds a health tourism authorisation certificate, linking the facility list and the intermediary list. This is the page to check a clinic against, and checking it takes about two minutes.

  • Authorised health facilities
  • Authorised intermediary agencies
• 2.
  Uluslararası Sağlık Turizmi ve Turistin Sağlığı Hakkında Yönetmelik (Resmî Gazete, 26.04.2025, No. 32882)

  Official register

  The regulation itself, in the official gazette. Article 17 repeals the 2017 framework that most English-language guidance still describes; Article 6 sets the service standards an authorised facility works to, and Provisional Article 1 sets the dates by which each of them applies.

• 3.
  Sağlık Hizmetlerinde Tanıtım ve Bilgilendirme Faaliyetleri Hakkında Yönetmelik (Resmî Gazete, 12.11.2025, No. 33075)

  Official register

  How health services may be promoted. Article 5 sets the general rules (5(1)(d) limits specialist titles to the recognised specialties on the registered diploma), including the ban on price, discount and campaign information and on steering patients to a named provider; Article 8 sets different terms for facilities and agencies authorised for international patients (8(1)(b) requires the authorisation certificate to be published on their site; 8(1)(f) requires the site's facility name and URL to match the Ministry licence); Article 13 repeals the 2023 regulation (RG 29.07.2023, No. 32263).

• 4.
  USHAŞ — aracı kuruluş yetkilendirme (intermediary authorisation)

  Official register

  The state health services company authorises the agencies that arrange treatment, separately from the Ministry's authorisation of the facilities that provide it. A patient who cannot tell which of the two they are talking to can settle it here.

• 5.
  Joint Commission International — accredited organisations register

  Third-party accreditor

  The public register of JCI-accredited hospitals. A hospital's accreditation is either in this register or it is not, which makes it checkable in a way that a badge on the hospital's own website is not.

  • Ambulatory health care accreditation programme
• 6.
  TÜSKA — Türkiye Sağlık Hizmetleri Kalite ve Akreditasyon Enstitüsü

  Official register

  The accreditation institute's own notice to authorised facilities about the 31 December 2026 deadline, and what it says will happen to those that have not completed the process. Its register of accredited organisations is where a claim to hold the accreditation can be checked.

  • Organisations accredited by TÜSKA
  • What accreditation is, and which facilities it is compulsory for
• 7.
  Danıştay 10. Dairesi, 25.12.2025 — suspension of Article 6/1(c), reported by the Turkish Medical Association

  Official register

  The Council of State suspended the execution of the complication insurance requirement in the case brought by the Turkish Medical Association. The reason this matters to a patient is that the cover is still being marketed as a legal guarantee already in force.

Listing a body here is not a claim of endorsement by it. Where a figure could not be traced to a source of this kind, it was removed from the guide rather than published unattributed.