Presenting a Three-steps Framework of Facilitators Role in Development of Medical Tourism in the City of Isfahan

Presenting a Three-steps Framework of Facilitators Role in Development of Health Tourism in the City of Isfahan .There is increasing evidence that medical tourists seek help from medical travel facilitators help and management medial tourism. In medical tourism, these facilitators play a significant role as moderator in engaging between the prospective patients in one country and medical facilities elsewhere around the world. To date, the literature in medical tourism has focused almost exclusively on patients and health care providers . However, little is known empirically with regard to the importance of medical travel facilitators and their contributions in the medical tourism industry. Hence, the moderating and programing role of medical travel facilitators needs to be explored due to the rising number of medical tourist. This paper discusses identify the roles of health tourism facilitators in framework. It is also categorized in three steps including pre-travel, on-travel, and post-travel.Because a safe travel needs reliable informational sources like to tourism facilitators, the present study aims to presenting a three-step framework of facilitators' role in development of medical tourism in the city of Isfahan. The present study is a practical research from goal perspective. It also is considered as a survey from research methodology view. The statistical population of this study includes managers of health tourism in the city of Isfahan. A sample of 87 managers have been selected from this population by using snow-ball sampling method. A researcher-developed questionnaire has been used for collecting the research data. Finally, 66 questionnaires have been collected from respondents, which have been used in the final statistical analyses. The questionnaire validity and reliability have already been investigated and confirmed by researcher. Binomial test and sign test are the main statistical tests that have been used for analyzing the research data in the SPSS. Based on the findings of this study, health tourism facilitators roles include 30 items that 16 items of them are done in the pre-travel step, 8 items of them are done in the pre-travel step , and 6 items of them are done in the pre-travel step. Based on another part of our results , pre-travel roles are the most important ones and post-travel roles are the least important ones. Also our results revealed that travel planning is the most important roles of facilitators .

Our findings revealed that the roles of health tourism facilitators can be categorized in three steps including pre-travel, on-travel , and post-travel . The pre-travel roles include travel planning, negotiation with service providers , political guidance and physician consulting , therapy coordination , patience promotional efforts, linking patient to therapy teams, helping tourist in findings hospitals, traveling help, privacy affairs, evaluation of physicians and hospitals, helping in destination choice, transportation planning, elimination of waiting lines, and visa affairs. The on-travel roles include helping in destination services uses, pre-therapy affairs, helping in tourism affairs, physician-patient relationships management, social and cultural relationships management, safe environment, qualified maintenance, timeliness and value of services, and translation services. The post-travel roles include post-travel suggestions, potential responsibilities of therapy, after-therapy efforts, solving patient problems in his/her country, evaluation of patient approbation, and therapy quality. Our findings revealed that the roles of health tourism facilitators can be categorized in three levels including pre-travel, on-travel, and post-travel. The pre-travel roles include travel planning, negotiation with service providers, political guidance and physician consulting, therapy coordination, patience promotional efforts, linking patient to therapy teams , helping tourist in findings hospitals, traveling help, privacy affairs, evaluation of physicians and hospitals, helping in destination choice , transportation planning , elimination of waiting lines, and visa affairs. The on-travel roles include helping in destination services uses, pre-therapy affairs, helping in tourism affairs, physician-patient relationships management, social and cultural relationships management, safe environment, qualified maintenance , timeliness and value of services, and translation services. The post-travel roles include post - travel suggestions , potential responsibilities of therapy, after-therapy efforts, solving patient problems in his /her country , evaluation of patient approbation , and therapy quality. health tourism facilitators roles include 30 items that 16 items of them are done in the pre-travel step, 8 items of them are done in the pre-travel step, and 6 items of them are done in the pre-travel step. Based on another part of our results, pre-travel roles are the most important ones and post-travel roles are the least important ones. Also our results revealed that travel planning is the most important role of facilitators.