Accepted for/Published in: Journal of Medical Internet Research
Date Submitted: Oct 14, 2019
Date Accepted: Nov 11, 2020
Does doctors’ online reputation affect the sharing of outpatient experiences: an empirical study
ABSTRACT
Background:
The internet enables consumers to evaluate products before purchase, based on feedback submitted by like-minded individuals. Displaying reviews allows customers to assess comparable experiences and encourages trust, increased sales and brand positivity. Customers use reviews to inform decision making while organizations can predict future sales. Prior studies have focused on manufactured products, with little attention being paid to healthcare services. In particular, whether patients prefer to use websites to discuss doctors’ reputation has so far remained unanswered.
Objective:
We investigate how Patient Propensity to Post Treatment Experiences (PPPTE) changes based on doctors’ online reputation (medical quality and service attitude) in delivering outpatient care services. Further, we examine the moderating effects of hospitals’ (organizational) online reputation and disease severity.
Methods:
Fractional logistic regression was conducted on data collected from 7,183 active doctors on a Chinese online health community to obtain empirical results.
Results:
Our findings show that patients prefer to share treatment experiences for doctors who have a higher medical quality and service attitude (βservice attitude=0.233, p<0.001; βmedical quality=0.052, p<0.001), and who work in hospitals with a higher online reputation (β=0.001, p<0.001). Patients are more likely to share experiences of doctors who treat less severe diseases, as opposed to those treating severe diseases (β=-0.004, p<0.01). In addition, hospitals’ online reputation positively (negatively) moderates the relationship between medical quality (service attitude) and PPPTE, while the moderating effects of disease severity on doctors’ online reputation are negative.
Conclusions:
Our research contributes to both theory and practice by extending current understanding of the impact of individual reputation on consumer behavior. We investigate the moderating effects of organizational reputation and consumer characteristics in online health communities.
Citation
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