The dynamic impacts of online healthcare community on physician altruism: A Hidden Markov Model

• Main Authors: LUO, Kai, WANG, Qiu-hong, TEO, Hock Hai
• Format: text
• Language: English
• Published: Institutional Knowledge at Singapore Management University 2019
• Subjects: Physician Altruism; Online Healthcare Community; Hidden Markov Model; Databases and Information Systems; Medical Sciences
• Online Access: https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/sis_research/4689; https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/context/sis_research/article/5692/viewcontent/ICIS2019_Altruism.pdf
• Institution: Singapore Management University

Physician altruism is not only a key foundation of modern medical professionalism, but also a critical component in the theoretical health economics study. There is considerable interest in understanding the impacts of contemporary healthcare technology on physician altruism. In this paper, we investigate the dynamic influence of multiple incentive mechanisms developed by an online healthcare community (OHC) on physician altruism. We model physician altruism as the degree of tendency to benefit the patients at the cost of oneself and focus on the incentive mechanisms that give physicians social and economic returns. The dynamics of physician altruism is characterized via a Hidden Markov Model (HMM) that allows the effects of incentive mechanisms to change across individuals and over time. Our findings are among the initial efforts to understanding the nature of physician altruism and the mechanism through which it can be influenced. Implications for community owners and policy makers are discussed.