Patient recommendations as determining factor for the choice of physiotherapists

ABSTRACT

Increasingly, patients expect to be able to co-determine their medical providers and treatments. Such a participative role requires access to comprehensible information, which might often be gained through recommendations. Current research analyze recommendations in the context of hospitals, not focusing outpatient care, such as treatment by a physiotherapist. This study aims to reduce this research gap by investigating the choice of physiotherapists, emphasizing the role of patient recommendations. Standardized questionnaires were provided to patients of physiotherapists in the area of Salzburg Austria. The empirical data of 77 patients reveals that most patients consider recommendations essential when choosing their physiotherapist. A combination of strong and weak ties is commonly used when seeking and spreading such advice. Moreover, the spreading of recommendations is influenced by several patient, medical, atmospheric and provider characteristics. In contrast to traditional face-to-face recommendations, electronic references seems to play a rather subordinate role.

KEYWORDS:

• Health care
• recommendations
• word-of-mouth
• physiotherapist
• outpatient care

Acknowledgement

The authors are grateful to Linda Tuttle Weidinger, B.A., lecturer of English, University of Applied Sciences Upper Austria and Johannes Kepler University, Linz, Austria, for her language assistance and editing. The authors have disclosed that they have no significant relationship with or financial interest in any commercial companies pertaining to this article.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Sebastian Martin

Sebastian Martin is marketing professor at the University of Applied Sciences Upper Austria and Affiliated Researcher at the Johannes Kepler University Linz.

Dorothea Greiling

Dorothea Greiling is professor for Management Accounting and Head of the Institute of Management Accounting at the Johannes Kepler University Linz.

Bettina Danninger

Bettina Danninger was student at the University of Applied Sciences Upper Austria.