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Accepted for/Published in: JMIR Research Protocols

Date Submitted: Apr 19, 2024
Date Accepted: Oct 31, 2024

The final, peer-reviewed published version of this preprint can be found here:

Incentivizing Rural Work Preferences Among Specialist Physicians: Protocol for a Discrete Choice Experiment

Joshi A, Panchamia J, Pandya A

Incentivizing Rural Work Preferences Among Specialist Physicians: Protocol for a Discrete Choice Experiment

JMIR Res Protoc 2024;13:e59621

DOI: 10.2196/59621

PMID: 39652867

PMCID: 11667135

Incentivizing rural work preferences among specialist physicians: A Protocol for a Discrete Choice Experiment

  • Anushree Joshi; 
  • Jallavi Panchamia; 
  • Apurvakumar Pandya

ABSTRACT

Background:

Rationale: The issue of retaining specialists in rural parts of India poses a fundamental challenge affecting the healthcare system's functionality and provision of standard healthcare services. There has been an acute shortfall of specialist doctors at rural community health centres. This calls for immediate policy attention, which is imperative to address their current shortages and design effective rural retention strategies. In the present study, using discrete choice experiments (DCEs), individuals choose from multiple-choice preferences that resemble hypothetical job descriptions.

Objective:

Objective:

DCEs are a quantitative approach to assessing several aspects that impact job selection. They have gained popularity in research studies examining healthcare workers' choices. This study aimed to develop a detailed plan of a DCE method that was employed to determine the choices of specialist doctors' jobs. This protocol outlines the DCE method, which used an exploratory sequential (QUAL-QUAN) mixed-method research design to understand specialists' preferences and design reward packages that would effectively motivate them to work in underserved regions.

Methods:

Methods and Analysis: The qualitative phase of the study involved identifying job factors and their corresponding levels for the DCE. This was done meticulously, which included reviewing relevant literature, qualitative pilot work, in-depth individual interviews, and consultation with medical and health experts. The quantitative phase of the study involved generating a D-efficient orthogonal fractional factorial design using Ngene software to create choice scenarios using the identified job factors and their corresponding levels. The generated choice scenarios were blocked into six versions and the participants were randomly divided into six blocks, each receiving one of the six questionnaire versions. The survey was administered to final-year postgraduate medical residents and specialist doctors across disciplines such as medicine, surgery, pediatrics, obstetrics, and gynecology from different public health facilities in Rajasthan. Fixed and Random effects panel logit models will be applied to explore the heterogeneity of responses and quantify the exchanges specialists will be willing to make for non-monetary features as a substitute for changes in the monetary attribute.

Results:

Results:

Following the ethics committee's acceptance of the study, the qualitative phase of data collection occurred from September 2021 to December 2021, while the quantitative phase took place from May 2022 to August 2022. Statistical analysis of the data has been initiated, and the preliminary findings are expected to be disseminated in August 2024.

Conclusions:

Conclusion: The protocol provides an integrated, systematic, and detailed framework for developing DCEs to assess specialist preferences in rural regions, which will inform policy interventions and future research. This procedure maintains the ethical, rigorous and transparent approach needed to improve research efficiency.


 Citation

Please cite as:

Joshi A, Panchamia J, Pandya A

Incentivizing Rural Work Preferences Among Specialist Physicians: Protocol for a Discrete Choice Experiment

JMIR Res Protoc 2024;13:e59621

DOI: 10.2196/59621

PMID: 39652867

PMCID: 11667135

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