| At present,the shortage and uneven distribution of medical resources in China have become increasingly prominent,which has led to a lack of effective communication between physicians and patients.In addition,the lack of communication will lead to low level of collaborative care between patients and physicians,severe patient-physician relationship and low patients’ outcomes.Online healthcare community,as an emerging communication platform,is providing a more convenient way for physician and patients to communicate.However,the characteristics of credence goods in medical services and the uncertainty and privacy of the online environment,have led to potential risks in online healthcare community.These risks will lead to ineffective communication between physicians and patients.Therefore,the advantages and disadvantages of the online healthcare community lead to a question that whether online healthcare community can facilitate physician-patient collaborative care,improve the patient-physician relationship,and improve patients’ wellbeing,by promoting communication between physicians and patients effectively.This paper analyzes the effectiveness and promotion strategies of online healthcare community,using physician-driven online healthcare community as the research background.First,based on the “patient-physician partnership” paradigm,this paper examines whether physician-driven online healthcare community can support and facilitate physician-patient collaborative care by analyzing the mutual effect of physicians’ and patients’ participation in online healthcare community.Further,we explore the mutual effects across different disease types.We found that physician-driven online healthcare community can support and facilitate physician-patient collaborative care,that is,physicians’ participation can affect patients’ participation,and patients’ participation can affect the participation of physicians,resulting in continuous interaction.However,the impact of patients’ participation on physicians’ participation varies among different diseases.We explain the differences from background factors,including the nature of the disease,time commitments,incentives for physicians vis-à-vis patients,and regulatory regime governing the online interactions between patients and physicians.Second,based on the theory of “patient-physician partnership”,this paper develops a theoretical framework of the impact of online healthcare community use on health outcomes.This paper examines the causal relationship between the use of the online healthcare community and patient-physician relationship and patients’ wellbeing,by designing and using a quasi-experiment.The findings show that the use of online healthcare community can help physicians to improve their relationship with their patients and improve their patients’ wellbeing.Then,based on the theory of “physician-patient communication theory framework” and “social support”,this paper explores the impact of different types of physicians’ and patients’ participation in physician-driven online healthcare community on patient-physician relationship and patients’ wellbeing.Specifically,we divide the physicians’ and patients’ participation into voluntary informationproviding,solicited information-providing,and socio-emotional communications.Using Instrument Variables and Generalized Method of Moments method,this paper estimates the causal effects of different types of physicians’ and patients’ participation in the online healthcare community.The results show that physicians’ voluntary information-providing but not solicited information-providing has a positive impact on the physicians’ relationship with their patients.In contrast,patients’ solicited information-providing but not voluntary information-providing has a significant positive impact on patient-physician relationship.Neither physicians’ nor patients’ socio-emotional communications have significant impact on patient-physician relationship.Consistent with the existing literature,patientphysician relationship has a significant impact on patients’ wellbeing.We also find that both physicians’ and patients’ socio-emotional support have significant effects on the patients’ wellbeing.Finally,this paper analyzes the promotion strategies of patients’ participation in the online healthcare community,by studying the impact of offline factors(including geographic distance,cultural differences,and medical resource differences)and online factors(online reputation and online contributions)on patients’ choice and participation in online healthcare community.The results of Poisson Pseudo-maximum Likelihood estimation show that geographical distance,cultural differences and medical resource differences can constrain patients’ selection and participation,while online reputation and online contribution can alleviate the negative effects of offline factors.Based on the physician-driven online healthcare community,this paper verifies the effectiveness of physicians’ and patients’ participation in the online healthcare community and gives a promotion strategy about how to improving patients’ selection and participation.This paper extends the current literature from patient-oriented social media to a social media application that engage both patients and their physicians.In addition,this paper has theoretical and practical implications on comprehensively understanding the impact of physicians’ and patients’ participation in the physician-driven online healthcare community,and exploring the influencing factors of affecting patients’ participation.This paper provides a theoretical framework for the further research on the impact of online healthcare community.Our results emphasize the importance of the online healthcare community,which will help to establish detailed guidelines on the development and proper use of social media in the healthcare field.In addition,this paper provides suggestions for controlling medical costs and reducing the burden on healthcare system,and guidelines on how to promote physicians’ and patients’ participations in online healthcare community for physicians,patients and platforms. |
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