It encompasses medical consultation, immunization, and prescription services. They can tell you, for example, whether you should have protection against such diseases as Yellow Fever, Malaria, or Japanese Encephalitis, and where to seek the best medical care in the area in which you will be traveling. Travel clinics, like the Johns Hopkins Travel Clinic, can provide you with an array of preventive services, information, and medicines. Their staff can recommend vaccinations against diseases you are likely to encounter and equipment and medicines you should carry to ward them off. While no one can accurately predict what they will ultimately experience, we can give them the best possible protection against what they are most likely to encounter.
Travelers are often in a higher risk mode, too.
They are out to enjoy themselves and thus in a different, perhaps less protective frame of mind. They must keep in mind that the risk of accidents and sickness are just as great and probably greater than here at home. Americans traveling overseas should confer with a health provider at least two weeks before departure. Long-term travelers should allow up to six months. Some immunization series, such as that for Hepatitis A and B, take up to six months to complete.