Designing a Model of Barriers to the Implementation of the 4th Generation Industry in the Health Care Sector with a Fuzzy Total Interpretative Structural Modeling Approach

The extensive advantages of the 4th generation of industry led to the entry of these technologies into the healthcare sector. Many countries have been able to create many competitive advantages by successfully implementing Healthcare 4.0. In Iran, the fourth generation of health care has not yet been properly investigated and implemented. Identifying implementation barriers and relationships between them can help decision makers in making appropriate decisions to facilitate Healthcare 4.0 implementing. This research was done with the aim of identifying these barriers and analyzing and relationship between them.

This research was done in 2 stages. In the first stage, using semi-structured interviews with experts and the use of thematic analysis, barriers were identified, and in the second stage, using a researcher-made questionnaire and the method of fuzzy total interpretative structural modeling, a causal model of relationships between barriers was designed to identify the most fundamental barriers. The method of sampling in both stages was judgment and snowball and the sample size in them is 16 and 10 people, respectively.

The results of interviews with experts led to the identification of 44 main barriers, which are divided into 7 categories: " barriers due to sanctions", "Financial and economic barriers", "Hardware and software barriers", "Cooperation barriers", "competitive barriers", "management barriers" and "human resource barriers" were categorized. The modeling results showed that "barriers caused by sanctions", "competitive barriers" and "human resource barriers" are respectively the most important barriers and should be given special attention in policy making.

The results of the research presented a new perspective on the barriers to healthcare 4.0. This perspective is about barriers related to sanctions and competitive issues. As a result, it is recommended to facilitate international communication, train decision-making and problem-solving skills, and develop knowledge-based activities to remove sanctions barriers. Also, facilitating public-private partnership and facilitating the presence of international companies in the field of healthcare can help increase competition.