amirreza tajzadeh namin

Medical tourism has considerably developed in recent years. Many patients travel to other countries to receive healthcare services. In this regard, medical tourists’ positive experiences of the services they receive make them loyal to the destination, being influenced by the prestige and reputation of the target destination and the patient’s perceived value of the healthcare centers’ brands. Therefore, as Tehran possesses the most advanced medical centers, including hospitals, clinics, and specialty clinics, this applied descriptive-correlational study sought to investigate the influence of medical tourists’ experience on destination loyalty, taking the intervening role of prestige and perceived value of the target medical centers’ brands into account. To this end, the required data were collected using a researcher-developed questionnaire. The population consisted of medical tourists who visited medical centers in District 1 of Tehran, out of whom 384 individuals were selected through convenience sampling. Finally, the collected data were analyzed via SPSS (Version 25) and Smart pls3 software using the Structural Equation Modeling. The study’s findings indicated that medical tourists’ experience exerted a positive significant influence on the destination’s prestige, perceived value, and loyalty. Moreover, it was found that the loyalty to the destination increased by an increase in medical tourists’ experience. Therefore, the prestige and perceived value of the destination’s medical centers must be greatly attended to.

Medical tourism is a relatively new topic. Despite the existence of many studies in the field of health in Iran, not much study has been done in the field of medical tourism market. The purpose of the present study is to investigate the antecedents of attracting medical tourists in the health towns of Isfahan. Applied and mixed research method of qualitative and quantitative type. In the qualitative research, a theoretical model was obtained by coding, using the theme method, and then the influential and influential variables were counted through the Dimtel method and Fuzzy network analysis. The findings showed that the highest weight, with a weight equal to 0.193, is related to the "travel expenses" dimension. Among the criteria, "cost of surgery" got the first priority. The criteria of "Distance from origin" is the second priority, "Complete tourist and treatment packages" is the third priority, "Transportation costs" is the fourth priority, "Coordination between the treatment staff" is the fifth priority, "Drug cost" is the sixth priority among 36 criteria, which is approximately 21%. They accounted for the percentage of the total weight of the criteria and this shows the great importance of these criteria. The results of the research show that the effective variables include technology and treatment equipment, quality of services and tourist attractions, cultural conditions and effective variables include travel costs, staff and treatment process, advertising and marketing, the most effective of which is the variable of technology and treatment equipment, and the most effective of them is the variable of travel costs.