Document Type : Original Article
Authors
1 PhD Student of Geography and Urban Planning, University of Isfahan, Isfahan, Iran
2 Professor of Geography and Urban Planning, University of Isfahan, Isfahan, Iran
3 Associate Professor of Geography and Urban Planning, University of Isfahan, Isfahan, Iran
Abstract
Introduction: Medical tourism refers to an international phenomenon of an individual’s travel in which most tourists travel long to access to treatment-therapeutic services who because of high cost, long waits, lacking in insurance, and use of services and lack of access to health services in the destination. domestic medical tourism also refers to the domestic travels of patients in pursuing better specialists, cheaper services with higher quality. This kind of travel is directly related to medical issues Methods: The dominating approach in the present study is developmental-applied and the method is analytical and survey study. The population includes domestic medical tourists (from other provinces) who traveled to Shiraz and according to the Statistical Center of Shiraz University of Medical Sciences, they were 70000. In the present study, to calculate the sample size of tourists, Cochrane Method was used. Concerning the population in the present study, the sample size which was calculated using Cochrane Method, for the domestic tourists 382 samples were identified, which because of more validity and reliability, it increases to 400 samples. The questionnaires were completed by the domestic medical tourists after achieving credibility and having reliability of 87% measured using Cronbach alpha. To measure the validity of questionnaires, they were given to some faculty members and professors including the supervisor and advisor of the thesis and their ideas and suggestions were employed. Some of the questions were deleted and also some others were added as suggested by the professors. In addition, some of them were modified. To analyze the data and test the research hypothesis, the linear Pearson correlation, multi variant regression and ANOVA were used. The statistical analysis was done by SPSS 19.0 software. Results: There was a significant correlation (p< 0.05) between the price treatment and tourist services, the quality of treatment and tourist services, culture, facilities, treatment and tourist equipment, ICT with the development of medical tourism in megalopolis Shiraz. Also, there was difference between medical tourists from various provinces regarding satisfaction with (price, quality, culture, facilities, equipment, and ICT). Conclusion: Untangling the price of medical and tourist services, enhancing the quality of medical and treatment services, increasing and enhancing the culture of attracting tourists, applying facilitates, treatment and tourist facilities and equipment having high technology and international standards, and applying ITC in order to advertise and market in the medical and tourist fields results in improving and enhancing medical tourism in megalopolis Shiraz.
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