If you’re planning treatment at a hospital in Seoul, Busan, or anywhere else in Korea, the visa question usually comes up before the medical question does — and it’s one of the top unanswered questions patients ask KmedTour’s chat assistant. There are two visa categories built specifically for international patients, and picking the wrong one costs time you don’t have when a procedure is already scheduled.
The two categories
C-3-3 (Short-Term Medical Visa) is for patients coming for a single round of treatment and recovery — most cosmetic, dental, and short-course procedures fall here. It’s issued for up to 90 days, single or multiple entry depending on your consulate, and is processed through the Korea Immigration Service’s HiKorea portal (hikorea.go.kr) or at a Korean embassy/consulate in your home country.
G-1-10 (Medical Stay Visa) is the longer-duration category, aimed at patients whose treatment plan runs past 90 days — oncology protocols, transplant follow-up, multi-stage reconstructive surgery, or fertility treatment cycles that need repeat visits over several months. It requires a treatment plan letter from the accepting hospital and can be extended in-country at a local immigration office without leaving Korea.
The distinction that trips people up: C-3-3 is tied to a single visit, while G-1-10 is tied to a treatment plan. A patient doing one rhinoplasty consultation-to-recovery cycle over three weeks needs C-3-3. A patient doing a six-month IVF cycle with multiple hospital visits needs G-1-10 — trying to renew C-3-3 for that instead means exiting and re-entering Korea, which most treatment plans can’t accommodate around procedure timing.
What the hospital has to give you first
Neither visa is a walk-in application. Both require an invitation or confirmation document from the treating hospital — this is usually a “medical service confirmation letter” or treatment plan letter with the hospital’s business registration number, the attending physician’s name, and the planned procedure or treatment course. Without it, HiKorea will reject the application outright. This is the step that actually determines your timeline: hospitals that specialize in international patients (most accredited centers under KAHF/KOIHA international health-tourism standards) can usually turn this letter around in 3–5 business days once your medical records and consultation are confirmed; hospitals without a dedicated international-patient desk can take two to three weeks, which is often the real bottleneck — not the visa office itself.
Documents to have ready before you apply
- Passport valid 6+ months beyond your planned stay
- Hospital invitation/confirmation letter (see above)
- Proof of sufficient funds for treatment and stay (bank statement or sponsor letter)
- Return or onward travel itinerary
- Passport photo meeting Korean visa photo specs
- For G-1-10: the multi-visit treatment plan from the hospital, not just a single appointment confirmation
Processing at a Korean consulate abroad typically runs 5–10 business days on top of however long the hospital takes to issue its letter — so the real lead time from “I want to book treatment” to “visa in hand” is usually 2–4 weeks, not the few days some agencies imply. Build that into your treatment date, not around it.
Where people get stuck
Two failure points show up repeatedly in patient questions to KmedTour’s coordinators and chat assistant:
- Applying for C-3-3 when the treatment plan is actually multi-stage. Reconstructive procedures, staged surgeries, or anything with a mandatory follow-up visit past the 90-day window needs G-1-10 from the start, not a C-3-3 renewal attempt mid-treatment.
- Booking flights before the hospital letter is issued. Airlines and Korea’s immigration checks both want to see a visa that matches your stated purpose of entry. A tourist visa with a hospital appointment booked on the side is not the same as a medical visa, and entry can be questioned at Incheon International Arrivals if the paperwork doesn’t line up.
Where to check current requirements
Visa rules and consulate-specific document lists shift, and requirements differ by nationality — some countries have visa-waiver arrangements with Korea that change how this applies. The authoritative sources are the Korea Immigration Service’s HiKorea portal (hikorea.go.kr) for the visa mechanics, and the Medical Korea portal (medicalkorea.or.kr), run under KHIDI (Korea Health Industry Development Institute), for hospital accreditation and the international-patient support framework these visa categories were built around. Your Korean consulate’s website will have the country-specific document checklist, since requirements for, say, a Nigerian passport holder and a UAE passport holder are not identical.
KmedTour coordinators pull the hospital confirmation letter into the patient’s booking flow directly rather than leaving it as a separate step patients have to chase down — the visa dependency on the hospital letter is exactly why that’s part of the intake process rather than an afterthought. If your treatment plan changes length mid-course (a C-3-3 patient whose recovery reveals a need for a second procedure, for example), tell your coordinator immediately — that’s the trigger point for switching visa category before the 90-day window runs out, not after.
This guide is general information, not immigration or legal advice. Visa requirements vary by nationality and change without notice — confirm current requirements with HiKorea or your nearest Korean consulate before booking travel.