The effect of healthcare policy signals on patients' perceived value, trust and intention to use services offered by a healthcare provider.

Abstract

Objective: Capitation is a healthcare reimbursement scheme in which a healthcare provider equitable access to funding for services and greater flexibility and budgeting. The objectives of the study are to investigate the effect of capitation signaling on patients' perceived value and trust and on their use intention.

Methods: This study was a scenario-based survey to examine interaction design, including capitation policy information and value-added health services information, which act as a combination of to test the hypotheses using signaling theory. Subject may receive the information about health services, information about a capitation policy, both of these two signals, or neither of them.

Results: The results of this study show that signal capitation policy and value-added health service information positively affects patients' perceived value, but not patients' trust. When a patient receives a signal either capitation policy information or value-added health service information, their perceived value, trust, and use intention are significantly higher than those who receive neither signal.

Conclusion: We suggest that high-quality healthcare institutions should consider distinguishing themselves from other low-quality providers by signaling information and allocate resources on value-added health services to enhance patients' awareness of healthy behavior and benefit from implementing a capitation payment scheme. This research contributes to healthcare stakeholders, especially policymakers and service providers, in terms of how best to engage with patients.