Explaining the model of customer value creation behavior in the development of health tourism industry in Guilan province

Today, with the development of communication techniques along with the transfer of medical knowledge, a new form of tourism called health has been introduced, which is one of the attractive and thriving services markets in the field of tourism. Value creation is a new form of business strategy that emphasizes the continuous creation and recognition of the shared values ​​of organizations and their customers. The aim of this study was to present a model of customer value creation behavior in the development of health tourism industry in Guilan province, of applied and combined type and in two qualitative and quantitative stages. The statistical population of the research in the qualitative phase included experts in the field of medical tourism and health tourists and in the quantitative phase included the heads of hospitals and health tourists in Guilan province. In the qualitative phase, 16 people were selected by purposive sampling method and in the quantitative phase, including 50 heads of hospitals in Guilan province and 250 health tourists from those hospitals, were selected by non-probability available method. Semi-structured interviews were used to collect data in the qualitative phase and questionnaire tools were used in the quantitative phase. Qualitative data analysis was performed with the help of MAXQDA10 software and quantitative data with PLS software.

After conducting the interviews and removing the overlaps, 59 basic concepts, 13 main concepts and finally, 5 categories in the form of a paradigm model including co-creation strategies of organizational value and health tourism capabilities, all Value creation and value creation behavior were extracted. In a quantitative step, the test model and all the relationships and hypotheses of the research were confirmedTourism has become one of the growing sectors in the world today and its impact goes far beyond the economic and business aspects. With the development of communication techniques along with the transfer of medical knowledge, a new form of tourism called health has emerged. Health tourism includes any trip to promote health and as one of the dimensions of tourism, contributes to the sustainable development and dynamism of the country's economy. Health tourism is also a national strategy to increase the country's income and an arm of national securityThis research is part of the results of a combined study (qualitative and quantitative) entitled "Explaining the model of customer value creation behavior in the development of health tourism industry (case study: health tourists in Guilan province)". This research has been done in two stages, qualitative and quantitative. In the first stage, due to the novelty of value creation research and the unknown factors and issues related to it in the field of health tourism, the data theory method is used and in the second stage, in order to confirm and validate the model from the quantitative research method of structural equations And correlation is used. The statistical population of the study, in the qualitative phase, included managers and scientific and executive experts with more than 5 years of experience in the field of health tourism and health tourists, and in the quantitative phase included heads of hospitals and health tourists referring to hospitals in Guilan province. First, 16 experts and tourists were selected by purposive sampling method and a semi-structured interview was conducted from them, and then questionnaires containing information extracted from the research model among 50 heads and managers of hospitals. Gilan province was selected and distributed by census method and 250 medical tourists from the same hospitals were selected and distributed by non-probability method.Qualitative data analysis was performed with three coding steps (open, axial and selective) in the form of foundation data method as follows:A) Open coding: Open coding was the first step in analyzing the data and during the step, data from interviews and research literature were carefully reviewed. The main unit of analysis for open coding are the concepts that in this study, these concepts were carefully extracted. Finally, at the end of this stage, 59 concepts were obtainedAxial coding: In this step, 59 codes extracted from the open coding step were combined, combined and categorized to form subcategories. In this way, the components of the value co-creation model in health tourism were identified and the categories that could be applied to the data from in-depth interviews and book analysis, related articles, were extracted. The categories extracted to formulate the model criteria were tourism capabilities, health tourism infrastructure, co-creation of organizational value (health tourism mix), co-creation of customer value, and co-creation behavior. In addition to the 5 main categories, 13 subcategories including 59 criteria related to value creation in health tourism were recategorized by open coding method.