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The main paths of medical tourism: From transplantation to beautification

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  • Chuang, Thomas C.
  • Liu, John S.
  • Lu, Louis Y.Y.
  • Lee, Yachi

Abstract

Medical tourism, combining the very polarized purposes of pleasurable travel and potentially stressful health care services, is an emergent and growing business worldwide. Medical tourism patients are willing to travel abroad to seek better quality, lower cost, domestically unavailable, no wait-time destinations for non-emergency medical care. There are numerous related studies in the academic literature that are substantiated with multidisciplinary and diverse backgrounds. This study uses the main path analysis, a unique quantitative and citation-based approach, to analyze the significant development trajectories, important literature, and recent active research areas in medical tourism. We find that there are two distinctive development paths: one path focuses more on the evolution of medical tourism, the motivation factors, marketing strategies, and economic analysis; the other path emphasizes organ transplant and related issues. These two paths eventually merge to a common node in the citation network, which foretells transplantation to beautification as the future research direction trend.

Suggested Citation

  • Chuang, Thomas C. & Liu, John S. & Lu, Louis Y.Y. & Lee, Yachi, 2014. "The main paths of medical tourism: From transplantation to beautification," Tourism Management, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 49-58.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:touman:v:45:y:2014:i:c:p:49-58
    DOI: 10.1016/j.tourman.2014.03.016
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    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. Soojung Kim & Charles Arcodia & Insin Kim, 2019. "Critical Success Factors of Medical Tourism: The Case of South Korea," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 16(24), pages 1-15, December.
    2. Neha Malhotra & Kartik Dave, 2022. "An Assessment of Competitiveness of Medical Tourism Industry in India: A Case of Delhi NCR," International Journal of Global Business and Competitiveness, Springer, vol. 17(2), pages 215-228, December.
    3. Israel Ayenigbara & Andrew Fadoju, 2020. "Determinants of Eatery Choice," Journal of Tourismology, Istanbul University, Faculty of Economics, vol. 6(2), pages 249-268, December.
    4. Vincent C. Ma & John S. Liu, 2016. "Exploring the research fronts and main paths of literature: a case study of shareholder activism research," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 109(1), pages 33-52, October.
    5. Junmo Kim & Juneseuk Shin, 2018. "Mapping extended technological trajectories: integration of main path, derivative paths, and technology junctures," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 116(3), pages 1439-1459, September.
    6. Koseoglu, Mehmet Ali & Rahimi, Roya & Okumus, Fevzi & Liu, Jingyan, 2016. "Bibliometric studies in tourism," Annals of Tourism Research, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 180-198.
    7. Carlos Sánchez‐Camacho & Rocío Carranza & David Martín‐Consuegra & Estrella Díaz, 2022. "Evolution, trends and future research lines in corporate social responsibility and tourism: A bibliometric analysis and science mapping," Sustainable Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 30(3), pages 462-476, June.
    8. de la Hoz-Correa, Andrea & Muñoz-Leiva, Francisco & Bakucz, Márta, 2018. "Past themes and future trends in medical tourism research: A co-word analysis," Tourism Management, Elsevier, vol. 65(C), pages 200-211.
    9. Chi-Yo Huang & Liang-Chieh Wang & Ying-Ting Kuo & Wei-Ti Huang, 2021. "A Novel Analytic Framework of Technology Mining Using the Main Path Analysis and the Decision-Making Trial and Evaluation Laboratory-Based Analytic Network Process," Mathematics, MDPI, vol. 9(19), pages 1-24, October.
    10. Vinaytosh Mishra & Mohita G. Sharma, 2021. "Framework for Promotion of Medical Tourism: A Case of India," International Journal of Global Business and Competitiveness, Springer, vol. 16(1), pages 103-111, December.
    11. Dalia Perkumienė & Milita Vienažindienė & Biruta Švagždienė, 2019. "Cooperation Perspectives in Sustainable Medical Tourism: The Case of Lithuania," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(13), pages 1-15, June.
    12. Liu, John S. & Lu, Louis Y.Y. & Lu, Wen-Min, 2016. "Research fronts in data envelopment analysis," Omega, Elsevier, vol. 58(C), pages 33-45.
    13. Yan, Jianghui & Tseng, Fang-Mei & Lu, Louis Y.Y., 2018. "Developmental trajectories of new energy vehicle research in economic management: Main path analysis," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 137(C), pages 168-181.
    14. Hiran H. Lathabai & Susan George & Thara Prabhakaran & Manoj Changat, 2018. "An integrated approach to path analysis for weighted citation networks," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 117(3), pages 1871-1904, December.
    15. Abderahman Rejeb & Alireza Abdollahi & Karim Rejeb & Mohamed M. Mostafa, 2023. "Tracing knowledge evolution flows in scholarly restaurant research: a main path analysis," Quality & Quantity: International Journal of Methodology, Springer, vol. 57(3), pages 2183-2209, June.
    16. Kim, Erin H.J. & Jeong, Yoo Kyung & Kim, YongHwan & Song, Min, 2022. "Exploring scientific trajectories of a large-scale dataset using topic-integrated path extraction," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 16(1).
    17. Huang, Chen-Hao & Liu, John S. & Ho, Mei Hsiu-Ching & Chou, Tzu-Chuan, 2022. "Towards more convergent main paths: A relevance-based approach," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 16(3).
    18. Yu, Dejian & Pan, Tianxing, 2021. "Tracing the main path of interdisciplinary research considering citation preference: A case from blockchain domain," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 15(2).
    19. Crush, Jonathan & Chikanda, Abel, 2015. "South–South medical tourism and the quest for health in Southern Africa," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 124(C), pages 313-320.
    20. Skountridaki, Lila, 2017. "Barriers to business relations between medical tourism facilitators and medical professionals," Tourism Management, Elsevier, vol. 59(C), pages 254-266.
    21. Peiman Ghasemi & Amir Mehdiabadi & Cristi Spulbar & Ramona Birau, 2021. "Ranking of Sustainable Medical Tourism Destinations in Iran: An Integrated Approach Using Fuzzy SWARA-PROMETHEE," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(2), pages 1-32, January.
    22. Chen, Kaihua & Zhang, Yi & Fu, Xiaolan, 2019. "International research collaboration: An emerging domain of innovation studies?," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 48(1), pages 149-168.

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