PureHealth and Dorchester Collection launch first-of-its-kind luxury healthcare partnership

PureHealth has announced a first-of-its-kind partnership in the Middle East, joining forces with the Dorchester Collection Academy to bring luxury hospitality principles into everyday healthcare delivery. The collaboration aims to transform how patients experience care across Abu Dhabi, combining advanced medicine with the warmth, attentiveness, and personalisation found in the world’s leading hotels.

Alejandro Helbling, Chief Patient Experience Officer at PureHealth, said the initiative marks a major shift in how the healthcare sector approaches service. “It’s the first time healthcare and hospitality are being integrated at this scale in the region,” he said. “We’re not simply borrowing ideas from hotels. We’re redesigning care around attentiveness, anticipation, and authenticity the same principles that define luxury hospitality but in a way that supports healing.”

The partnership introduces a new philosophy to the UAE’s healthcare ecosystem, one that places empathy at the centre of the patient journey. Through what PureHealth calls its Signature Patient Experience, the organisation is embedding compassion, respect, and emotional support into every stage of care from the first appointment to recovery.

Helbling noted that emotional wellbeing is closely tied to clinical outcomes. “When patients feel safe and heard, their anxiety goes down, their trust increases, and their recovery improves,” he said. “This is what real innovation looks like.”

As part of the collaboration, PureHealth and Dorchester Collection Academy will launch a leadership development programme for senior executives, including Patient Experience Directors and Chief Patient Officers. Through hands-on workshops and scenarios, leaders will learn how to model empathy, strengthen communication, and promote patient-centred thinking within their teams.

“These are the behaviours that turn empathy from an idea into a culture,” Helbling said. “Change begins when leaders practise what they expect from others.”

The first phase of the programme will focus on PureHealth’s leadership before expanding to more than 400 employees across hospitals and clinics. The aim is to build a consistent environment where patients feel cared for from the moment they arrive.

Beyond training, the partnership will also explore how hospitality principles can influence the design and feel of healthcare spaces. Helbling noted that elements such as lighting, sound, and scent play a major role in shaping how patients feel. “We’re studying how these sensory elements can make clinical environments more calming and restorative,” he said.

Nutrition will also be a future area of development. “We’re looking at how food can support healing not just as nourishment, but as comfort,” he added.

The initiative reflects the UAE’s continued push to be a global leader in healthcare innovation, setting new standards not only through technology but through human connection. “The UAE is showing the world what future-ready healthcare looks like,” Helbling said. “Technology and humanity are not opposites they work best together. This partnership proves that empathy can scale.”

To ensure emotional care is part of measurable progress, PureHealth is developing new tools to track patient sentiment, real-time experience data, and staff wellbeing. These indicators will sit alongside traditional clinical metrics to ensure that care is both effective and compassionate.

As the new framework is introduced across its network, PureHealth expects patients to feel a clear difference in how they are welcomed, how concerns are addressed, and how support continues even after they leave the hospital.

“This isn’t a campaign,” Helbling said. “It’s a cultural evolution. We’re building a new language of care one that is human, heartfelt, and ready for the future.”