The Medical Tourism Index and Behavioral Responses of Medical Travelers: A Mixed-Method Study

Abstract

This empirical study applies complexity theory to understand complex interactions of demographics and medical tourism index (MTI) dimensions in predicting causal models leading to high and low levels of satisfaction and behavioral intentions among medical travelers. A questionnaire-based survey is applied to investigate causal models (i.e., a combination of predictors) to predict satisfaction and the behavioral intentions of international patients who traveled to Cyprus. This study also conducted an in-depth interview to identify motives, complications, and conditions stimulating the behaviors of medical travelers. According to the necessary condition analysis (NCA) results, three dimensions of MTI, excluding cost, are necessary to achieve satisfaction and desired behavioral intention. Findings from interviews reveal that medical complications and legal conditions in the origin country influence medical traveler’s behaviors. The model testing results support key tenets of complexity theory and extend our knowledge of how to regulate conditions to discharge a dis/satisfied and dis/loyal patient.

The combined use of symmetric and asymmetric approaches: partial least squares-structural equation modeling and fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis

“…In a complex output, all the possible configurations leading to the given outcome are calculated using Quine-McCluskey algorithm. While the resulting number of recipes can be large, such an output is appropriate in sensitive application areas, for example in medical tourism (Olya and Nia, 2020). Because of the solution's complexity, it is not a straightforward task to interpret all complex configurations and, accordingly, derive implications from the analysis.…”

“…Recent years have seen a significant increase in fsQCA applications in various social science disciplines (Farmaki et al, 2021;Kadile and Biraglia, 2020;Mikalef and Pateli, 2017;Pappas et al, 2019;Phung et al, 2020;Xie and Wang, 2020), especially in the field of hospitality and tourism (Olya, 2020;Rasoolimanesh et al, 2020). In this field, researchers have applied fsQCA in different contexts, such as evaluating travelers' willingness to pay (Agag et al, 2020), tourism accommodation services (Pappas and Papatheodorou, 2017), festival management (Gannon et al, 2019;, tourist behavior in green hotels (Olya et al, 2019a), peer-to-peer accommodation (De Canio et al, 2020;Pappas, 2017), medical tourism (Olya and Nia, 2020) and tourist engagement (Rasoolimanesh et al, 2020).…”

“…The fsQCA rescales the original values of dependent and independent variables into continuous fuzzy values, which fall into a [0, 1] interval. For example, a value of 1 in a seven-point Likert scale translates into a fuzzy value of 0, whereas values of 4 and 7 turn into fuzzy values of 0.5 and 1, respectively (Olya and Alipour, 2015;Olya and Nia, 2020). Analogously, latent variable scores produced by PLS-SEM can be rescaled into fuzzy values.…”

Framework for Promotion of Medical Tourism: A Case of India

“…Medical tourism is not a simple process. It is a complex decision by an international traveler based on the attributes of the host country, facilities of healthcare professionals, reasonable cost, and the service quality of hospitality and tourism (Chuang et al, 2014 ; Fetscherin & Stephano, 2016 ; Olya & Nia, 2021 ). Some studies are exploring the development of the Medical Tourism Index (MTI) and four dimensions of MTI include country environment, tourism destination, medical tourism costs, and medical facility and services (Fetscherin & Stephano, 2016 ).…”

Customer experience management in medical tourism (case study: Iranian hospital’s medical tourists)

“…In addition to the different views in terms of medical tourism discussed in the previous section, it is also reviewed and defined for potential research participants (Olya and Nia, 2020;Yusof and Rosnan, 2020). The motivation for medical tourists is to gain access to therapies or treatments intended as a cure for a specific medical subject matter, condition or problem, whereas an individual who engages in wellness travel is in overall good health and seeks treatments and experiences to maintain their well-being, as explained earlier (Smith and Puczk o, 2009;Soltani et al, 2020;Taheri et al, 2020).…”