If Sicko takes you to Cuba to hold up the US healthcare system to ridicule, here come reports that more and more Americans are eyeing Mexico on the border as an option. Healthcare in Mexico is becoming high-quality, cheap and convenient, it is now felt.

As more Americans go without heath insurance or feel the pinch of managed care, some are making a run for the border for treatment ranging from routine care to live-saving procedures.

Two North Texas-based hospital chains, Christus Health of Irving and International Hospital Corp. of Dallas, are tapping into a need and an opportunity by providing in their hospitals in Mexico what their executives say are the best of both worlds – U.S.-quality health care and relatively low Mexican prices.

"Our goal is to have the safest hospitals in the international market," said Cliff Orme, CEO of International Hospital Corp. "We're implementing U.S. standards into these hospitals so you won't notice the difference going to a hospital in Dallas than one in a Latin American country."

Some experts, including Peter Maddox of Christus Health, see Mexico as an answer to the complex question of how to treat aging and underinsured Americans at a time when the retirement of baby boomers will further tax the U.S. health care system. An estimated 43 million Americans, about 15 percent of the population, are uninsured, according to a Census Bureau study.