Incentive problem and countermeasures of telemedicine providers in China / 中华医院管理杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective:To analyze the actual and expected incentives and key issues of telemedicine providers in China and to provide important references for optimizing telemedicine incentive policies.Methods:The sample data came from a questionnaire survey of 1 084 providers in 7 provinces of Fujian, Hainan, Henan, Hunan, Guizhou, Sichuan and Qinghai in October and November 2019 and a semi-structured interview data at 6 hospitals in Henan province in January 2020. Descriptive analysis was used to sort such data into text data for classified summation.Results:The greatest gaps were found between actual incentives and expected ones in expense subsidies, title promotion and excellence awards, with such gaps as high as 18.65, 28.26, 29.28 percentages among providers of junior, deputy senior and senior academic titles respectively. Hospitals fall short in providing adequate incentives for telemedicine providers, not to mention lack of differentiation and diversification in personnel incentives, and poor implementation of incentive policies.Conclusions:It is suggested to strengthen incentive demand analysis, break the homogenization bottleneck of incentive policies, and consolidate internal publicity and implementation of incentive policies.