Abstract

Background: The integration of online and offline services has become critical in healthcare settings, where technical and interpersonal service qualities are essential for maintaining patient satisfaction and engagement. However, discrepancies between these offline and online dimensions can significantly impact physician performance. Understanding how these discrepancies influence healthcare outcomes is crucial for optimizing service strategies.

Method: Using a unique dataset of 3,878 physicians from a large Chinese online health platform, this study employed a prompted generative AI model to extract technical and interpersonal qualities from patients’ online and offline reviews. We then adopted polynomial modeling and response surface analysis (PMRSA) to test our hypotheses.

Results: Our findings reveal that as online-offline service quality (either technical or interpersonal service quality) increases in the same direction, physician performance increases first and then decreases, exhibiting an inverted U-shape relationship. Moreover, as the degree of incongruence between online and offline service quality (either technical or interpersonal service quality) increases, physician performance decreases.

Conclusion: Balancing online and offline technical and interpersonal services is critical for maximizing patient volume in healthcare settings. This study underscores the reliability of AI-based approaches for assessing service quality and extends the service quality literature by offering strategies to enhance physician performance. Our work provides managerial insights for healthcare providers by emphasizing the importance of maintaining consistent service quality across both online and offline platforms. The results emphasize the importance of integrated, balanced service delivery in the emerging era of medical digitalization in the Asia-Pacific region.

Download

Share

COinS