To assess physician selection preferences and willingness to pay among social media users in direct-to-consumer teleconsultations for minor common conditions.
A discrete choice experiment was conducted among users of WeChat and Rednote who had used at least one medical app and logged into social media ≥3 times in the past three months.Snowball sampling covered East, South, Southwest, and Northwest China. An orthogonal design generated choice sets with five attributes: consultation price, hospital level, physician gender, professional title, and post-consultation rating. A mixed logit model estimated preference coefficients and willingness to pay.
A total of 190 valid responses from 42 cities were analyzed, of which 73.68% were from participants aged 18-24 years. Participants preferred physicians with positive ratings (vs.neutral/negative, β=0.70, P<0.001), lower consultation prices (per ¥1 increase, β=-0.52, P<0.001), associate chief physicians(vs. chief/attending, β=0.43, P<0.001), and physicians from tertiary grade A hospitals (vs. hospitals below the tertiary grade A level, β=0.30, P<0.001). Physician gender showed no significant effect (P>0.05). Willingness to pay premiums was ¥103.43(95% CI: 39.94-166.92) for positively rated physicians, ¥64.55 (95% CI: 36.01-93.09) for associate chief physicians, and¥44.60 (95% CI: 26.49-62.72) for physicians from tertiary grade A hospitals.
In teleconsultations for minor common conditions, the influence of traditional medical signals is attenuated, while post-consultation ratings become the primary determinant of user choice.
| 科 Family | 属数 Number of genus | 种数 Number of species | 占总种数比例 Percentage of total species (%) | 属 Genus | 种数 Number of species | 占总种数比例 Percentage of total species (%) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 鹅膏菌科Amanitaceae | 2 | 11 | 5.26 | 鹅膏菌属 Amanita | 10 | 4.78 |
| 小菇科 Mycenaceae | 2 | 12 | 5.74 | 丝盖伞属 Inocybe | 5 | 2.39 |
| 多孔菌科 Polyporaceae | 8 | 14 | 6.70 | 蜡蘑属 Laccaria | 5 | 2.39 |
| 红菇科 Russulaceae | 3 | 23 | 11.00 | 小皮伞属 Marasmius | 6 | 2.87 |
| 小菇属 Mycena | 11 | 5.26 | ||||
| 光柄菇属 Pluteus | 5 | 2.39 | ||||
| 红菇属 Russula | 17 | 8.13 | ||||
| 栓菌属 Trametes | 5 | 2.39 |