THE EFFECT OF EXHIBITION SERVICE QUALITY OF MEDICAL TOURISM IN ATTENDANCE SATISFACTION AND BEHAVIORAL INTENTION

With the rapid growth of the medical tourism industry and the increasing interest in related industry exhibitions, this research investigated the effect of exhibition service quality of medical tourism on attendance satisfaction and behavioral intention. A self-administered questionnaire was designed and collected from 353 domestic and international general attendees who visited a medical tourism exhibition. The results show that the critical underlying factors of exhibition service quality of medical tourism were discovered by exploratory factor analysis. The relationship between exhibition service quality, satisfaction, and behavioral intention was also assessed using regression analysis. The results indicated that four important factors of exhibition service quality of medical tourism (i.e., product quality, environment quality, delivery quality, and social quality) were identified. Moreover, social quality was found to have the greatest significant influence on satisfaction, followed by product quality, environment quality, and delivery quality. Attendance satisfaction also significantly influenced behavioral intention. The study determined that a medical tourism exhibition is a useful strategic marketing tool to actively promote the medical tourism industry when exhibition service quality of medical tourism positively and significantly influences attendance satisfaction and behavioral intention. It also suggested that improving the exhibition service quality of medical tourism may lead both domestic and international general attendees to become medical tourists in domestic medical tourism markets.