The Influence Of Factors On Dental Tourists' Satisfaction In Hoi An City, Vietnam

Abstract

Today, medical tourism is an emerging industry that attracts many countries around the globe to invest in. It refers to traveling in which people go on vacations (often to an unusual environment) that involve experiencing medical treatments for physical health protection, mental status revival, or beauty. As a subset of medical tourism, dental tourism is growing in popularity and the trend is expected to escalate even more in the future. The projected market leaders in this industry are countries in the Asia-Pacific region such as Brazil, India, and Thailand. Vietnam is a country with a huge potential of growing dental tourism. However, the country is still not recognized as a strong player, thus is not as highly recommended and known as a dental tourism destination as neighboring nations in the continent. In this scenario, it is critical that managers, marketers, and policymakers in the industry in Vietnam understand the factors influencing dental tourists' satisfaction. Through the study of satisfaction, they could recommend strategies for customer loyalty, which is crucial for the success and sustainable growth of an organization in the long-term. However, the amount of research on this aspect of dental tourism is still very limited, and there has been no research on the topic in Vietnam. Thus, the aim of the study is to examine the effect of factors on dental tourists’ satisfaction in Hoi An city – one of the top tourist destinations in Vietnam. The research method is quantitative-based, and the instrument used to collect data is the questionnaire. The target population is dental tourists in Hoi An City aged 18 above. The data is analyzed using descriptive statistics and multiple regression analysis. The results show that there are 6 factors that have a positive influence on dental tourists’ satisfaction: dental treatment quality, dental service quality, dental tourism infrastructure, destination appeal, destination culture, and ease of access. Dental treatment quality is the factor with the strongest positive impact on the satisfaction of dental tourists, followed by ease of access. Meanwhile, destination culture is proven to have the least effect on these tourists’ satisfaction. From the research findings, the study suggests several ways that authorities and service providers in dental tourism destinations may take into consideration to improve the satisfaction of dental tourists.