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Contribution Details

Type Journal Article
Scope Discipline-based scholarship
Title Do patients value a hospital’s innovativeness reputation? A multi-method approach to assess the relative importance of innovativeness reputation in patients’ hospital choice
Organization Unit
Authors
  • Sebastian Gurtner
  • Nadine Hietschold
  • María Vaquero Martín
Item Subtype Original Work
Refereed Yes
Status Published in final form
Language
  • English
Journal Title Health Services Management Research
Publisher Royal Society of Medicine Press
Geographical Reach international
ISSN 0951-4848
Volume 31
Number 3
Page Range 138 - 153
Date 2018
Abstract Text Innovations in health care are costly and risky, but they also provide the opportunity for hospitals to increase quality of care, to distinguish themselves from competitors and to attract patients. While numerous hospitals strive to increase their innovativeness by adopting a costly innovation leader strategy, the question of whether this actually influences the patient’s choice remains unanswered. To understand the role of innovativeness from the patient perspective, this study conceptualizes the construct of innovativeness reputation of hospitals and determines its relevance in patients’ hospital choice decisions. In the pretest, we identified six dimensions of innovativeness reputation such as progressive work procedures and value added services. We then used three different quantitative multi-criteria decision-making methods to evaluate the relative importance of innovativeness reputation in patient choice. We collected data from 355 former German patients who had undergone elective non-emergency surgery. Overall, innovativeness reputation accounts for 11.6%–16.8% of the patient decision. Innovativeness reputation has a moderate influence on hospital choice and should be taken into account by managers. Since technical innovations are costly, hospitals should use other means to enhance their innovative image. Strategies such as emphasizing value added services can enable hospitals to increase their innovativeness reputation efficiently.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1177/0951484817748157
Other Identification Number merlin-id:15924
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Additional Information This is the final draft, after peer-review, of a manuscript published in RSM journals: www.rsmpress.com.