Abstract :

The Rapid Digitalization Of Healthcare Delivery Has Fundamentally Altered How Patients Search For, Evaluate, And Select Healthcare Providers And Services. Online Hospital Ratings, Telemedicine Platforms, Mobile Health Applications, Social Media Reviews, And Digital Insurance Portals Now Compete With Traditional Word-of-mouth Referrals And Physician Recommendations As Primary Information Sources For Patients. This Paper Investigates The Key Factors Influencing Patients Healthcare Service Selection Decisions In The Digital Era, With Particular Emphasis On The Relative Importance Of Online Reviews And Ratings, Telemedicine And Mobile-app Availability, Digital Literacy, Cost Transparency, Insurance-network Integration, And Perceived Data Privacy. Primary Data Was Collected Through A Structured Questionnaire Administered To 180 Patients Across Urban And Semi-urban Healthcare Consumers In Two Cities, Supplemented By Secondary Data Drawn From Published Healthcare-industry Reports And Academic Literature. Descriptive Statistics, Weightedmean Ranking, And Chi-square Tests Of Independence Were Used To Analyze Factor Importance And Demographic Variation. Findings Indicate That Online Reviews And Ratings, Doctor Availability Through Digital Booking, And Cost Transparency Emerge As The Three Most Influential Factors, While Digital Literacy Significantly Moderates Reliance On Telemedicine Platforms Among Older Respondents. The Study Concludes With Recommendations For Healthcare Providers To Strengthen Digital Reputation Management, Simplify Appointmentbooking Interfaces, And Improve Transparency In Online Cost Disclosure To Enhance Patient Acquisition And Retention In An Increasingly Digital Healthcare Marketplace.

Published:

03-7-2020

Issue:

Vol. 20 No. 7 (2020)

Page Nos:

13-20

Section:

Articles

License:

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

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