The purpose of the paper is to consider development barriers and tools for targeted support and stimulation of the growth of this sector of the economy, as well as the peculiarities of the impact of the pandemic COVID-19 on the growth and development prospects of the Russian inbound medical tourism market. Methodology. The article is based on a qualitative sociological study conducted in November 2019 –December 2020, with focus groups and expert interviews method usage. In total, there were conducted 8 expert interviews and 4 focus groups. Findings. The launch of the federal project "Development of the export of medical services" within the framework of the federal program "Development of healthcare", the creation of the Moscow medical cluster, the development of regional markets for inbound medical tourism are considered as institutional measures that can facilitate the target audience's access to the resources of Russian medical clinics. The value of results. As part of the research, the authors for the first time have introduced the analysis of the first results of inbound medical tourism development in 2017-2020 in Russia. The differences between the export of medical services and the market of inbound medical tourism were revealed. The authors put forward the thesis about the export of medical services as the first phase of the development of the market of inbound medical tourism. This analysis identifies areas for further research.