Dialysis While Traveling in Guatemala: Centres, Booking Steps and Who Pays (2026)

Guatemala has a private dialysis network with five centres (SUMÉDICA, part of NEFRA Medical Care), plus two Guatemala City hospitals with their own hemodialysis units. None of the centres or hospital units publishes a visiting-patient price; the only published request form is NEFRA’s travel programme, which asks for at least three months’ notice. You can also write to a centre directly. Settle payment before you fly: Medicare does not cover dialysis abroad except during a qualifying inpatient stay.

This page covers the booking task only: who to contact, what each provider publishes and what to have ready. It is not medical advice; treatment decisions stay with your nephrologist and the receiving unit. Facts are from each provider’s own pages and Medicare’s fact sheet, read on 31 October 2026.

Quick summary

The NEFRA network in Guatemala: SUMÉDICA

NEFRA Medical Care’s Guatemala page says NEFRA, a GRUPO OLMOS company, acquired Fresenius Medical Care’s dialysis clinics and centres in Guatemala and took their centres and professionals into its network. The operator it presents for Guatemala is SUMÉDICA, which the page calls a leading hemodialysis company in the country, with 4 centres in Guatemala City and one in Quetzaltenango, more than 222 Fresenius machines (models 4008 or 5008), and patients from across the country, especially the centre and west. The page lists peritoneal dialysis, hemodialysis and hemodiafiltration among NEFRA’s services.

NEFRA’s centre finder embeds a map. Its Guatemala entries:

The map entries give no hours. NEFRA’s Guatemala page publishes a patient-enquiries contact in Buenos Aires (Azopardo 1405, Piso 5, CABA), not a Guatemala booking line, so the travel form below is the published route for a visitor.

Booking through NEFRA’s travel programme

NEFRA’s travel-dialysis page (in Spanish) lists Argentina nationwide and, internationally, “Conexión directa en nuestra red LATAM (Perú, Curazao y Guatemala)”. Outside that network it says it guides the patient’s search, and it works with No Kidney Travel on patient logistics.

1. Who can apply: patients of NEFRA centres and of external centres, and their families.
2. When: “Iniciá tu solicitud al menos 3 meses antes de viajar”, so that treatment shifts and logistics can be coordinated.
3. Step 1: fill in the form with your destination and approximate date.
4. Step 2: NEFRA reviews your treatment and the available alternatives.
5. Step 3: it looks for compatible centres and availability.
6. Step 4: it contacts you to plan the trip.

NEFRA says each inquiry is assessed individually against the destination and centre availability, your medical needs and type of treatment, travel dates and shift coordination, and medical coverage. It names work trips, family visits and short breaks as well as holidays.

Two Guatemala City hospital units

Neither hemodialysis page says whether it takes visiting patients, how far ahead to book or what a session costs. Those are the first three questions to send.

Herrera Llerandi’s page has two preparation notes that matter to a visitor: a session takes several hours, and on a first visit the unit asks you to bring the list of medicines you take and your recent test results. The page lists six hospital sites (Sede Central, Pasaje Naranjo, Plaza Varietá, Décima Plaza, Santa Rosalía and Las Brisas) without saying which hosts the dialysis unit, so confirm the address when you book.

Who pays: Medicare and other cover

Medicare’s fact sheet Medicare Coverage Outside the United States (CMS Product No. 11037, April 2026) answers the dialysis question directly: unless you get dialysis during an inpatient hospital stay under one of its three foreign-hospital situations, Medicare does not cover dialysis when you travel outside the U.S. The three situations:

• You are in the U.S. when a medical emergency happens and the foreign hospital is closer than the nearest U.S. hospital that can treat you.
• You are travelling through Canada by the most direct route between Alaska and another state when an emergency happens, and the Canadian hospital is closer.
• You live in the U.S. and the foreign hospital is closer to your home than the nearest U.S. hospital that can treat you.

The same fact sheet says:

• Medigap plans C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, M and N include foreign travel emergency care: 80% of billed charges for certain medically necessary emergency care after a $250 yearly deductible, a $50,000 lifetime limit, and only for care that begins in the first 60 days of the trip.
• Medicare Advantage and other Medicare health plans may cover more outside the U.S.; check with your plan before travelling.
• Drugs bought outside the U.S. are not covered by Medicare plans.
• Travel insurance does not necessarily include health coverage, so read the conditions.

The wider Medicare rules for a Guatemala trip are on our Medicare on a trip to Guatemala page. Canadians: provincial plans differ, and our Canadian health insurance abroad page sets them out by province. For a private policy, see travel insurance for a multi-country Central America trip.

What to send the centre

A short written request gets a usable answer faster. Based on what the providers above publish, include:

• Dates and city: arrival and departure dates and where you are staying. SUMÉDICA has centres in four parts of the capital’s metro area and in Quetzaltenango; Centro Médico’s unit is in Zona 10; Herrera Llerandi’s page does not say which site hosts dialysis.
• Treatment type: hemodialysis or peritoneal dialysis, and your usual schedule. NEFRA assesses each case by type of treatment.
• Records: the medicine list and recent test results Herrera Llerandi asks first-time patients to bring, plus whatever else the centre names.
• Payment: ask for a written quote and how they take payment, and say whether an insurer will be involved, since NEFRA lists coverage among the points it assesses.
• Confirmation: ask for the session dates and the centre’s address in writing before you book flights.

If you are only connecting through the capital, our long layover in Guatemala City page covers leaving La Aurora on a connection. For a separate travel-health question, see altitude and elevation in Guatemala.

Sources

All read on 31 October 2026.

• NEFRA Medical Care: Guatemala
• NEFRA Medical Care: centre finder (Guatemala entries from its embedded map)
• NEFRA Medical Care: Viajar en diálisis
• Centro Médico: Hemodiálisis
• Hospital Herrera Llerandi: Hemodiálisis en Guatemala
• Medicare: Medicare Coverage Outside the United States (fact sheet, April 2026)