• Journal of Korean society of Dental Hygiene
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• v.12 no.4
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• pp.715-722
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• 2012

Objectives : The purpose of this study is to suggest an effective future development direction of dental medical tourism in Korea by examining dental hygienists' perception of medical tourism and factors which are necessary to boost medical tourism. Methods : The subjects in this study were the dental hygienists who worked in Seoul. The study was conducted on 189 people who participated in refresher training, which was held in November 2010, by the Seoul Dental Hygienist Association. Self-administered questionnaire surveys were used. Results : 1. 106 people (56.1%) responded that medical tourism is "a tour to treat illness" and 73 (39.5%) responded that the introduction of medical tourism is "timely." 2. opposition against the introduction of medical tourism accounted for the highest proportion (61.6%) and the reason for it was "concern for mushrooming of untested types of medical treatment." 3. 131 people (71.6%) responded that they are willing to participate in medical treatment of medical tourism and 172 (93.0% of participants) cited "communication" as a most difficult issue. 4. Those who recognized medical tourism proved to have higher intentions to invest time and money to prepare for it (p<.002). Conclusions : In order to boost medical tourism, a unified treatment program for foreigners and training program for medical staff throughout the hospitals should be established.

• Smart Media Journal
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• v.13 no.2
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• pp.156-164
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• 2024

The Metaverse as a combination of physical and digital space, provides many consumers with a different process of search, evaluation, consumption, and disposal than before, based on hyper-connected and hyper-realistic services. Therefore, it is necessary to examine what kind of sensory experiences customers feel when performing various activities in the Metaverse and how these experiences affect customers' behavioral responses. This study measured the temporal and emotional experience of the Metaverse service environment felt during the Metaverse experience journey of customers experiencing medical tourism services. The results of the study showed that the emotional experience through Metaverse had a more positive impact on customer satisfaction and customer loyalty as the intensity of the Metaverse experience deepened. In particular, it was confirmed that the emotional experience at the end of the Metaverse service had a positive influence on repurchase behavior. These results show that, just as in the real world, customer experience in the Metaverse can provide important insight into understanding customers' post purchase behavior and how service providers can develop and implement effective customer experience strategies in the Metaverse environment.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.20 no.4
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• pp.571-581
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• 2020

There are large, medium, and small items in the evaluation test for medical interpreter professionals personnel and the criteria and level are not clear, which may cause confusion for those preparing for the test. Therefore, we would like to suggest that the qualification requirements for the medical translation ability test and the criteria for the evaluation items are consistent with the medical system in Korea. The survey on the medical interpreter competency test conducted was collected from domestic and foreign data, compared with similar test and overseas test. We also examined the perception of the test by experts with experience in developing and interpreting the medical interpretation test. As a result, in the 'International Culture' evaluation category, 'Language-oriented culture' was changed to 'Medical-oriented culture' and 'Interpretation ethics' was changed to 'Medical interpretation ethics'. In the evaluation items of the hospital system, the 'Medical Dispute Mediation Act', which is 「ACT ON MEDIATION OF MEDICAL DISPUTES」 of the middle item was changed the 「ACT ON REMEDIES FOR INJURIES FROM MEDICAL MALPRACTICE AND MEDIATION OF MEDICAL DISPUTES」 and the Act also reduced the four items related to the 'Medical Tourism Law' to two and added the 「ACT ON SUPPORTING THE ADVANCEMENT OF MEDICAL OVERSEAS AND ATTRACTING FOREIGN PATIENTS」. If the Medical Interpretation Proficiency Test is prepared in accordance with the medical culture of Korea, it is expected that there will be a stable opportunity for professionals who pass the examination to act as experts.

• Journal of Arbitration Studies
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• v.26 no.4
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• pp.111-128
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• 2016

Trade between nations has been considered as exchange for material things. According to recent changes in the paradigm of global trade, trade is shifting focus on the exchange of an immaterial being. Among them, the service sector is growing fast and the health service has shown exceptional growth as the healthcare market is consistently expanding. It is also part of the global service targeting people all around the world. People visiting other countries for medical service tend to spend more money and stay longer than a traveler. For these reasons, global medical service is in the spotlight as a promising and higher value-added business. The global medical service industry has been developed around Asia, specifically Thailand, Singapore, India, etc. Compared to them, Korea has come late into the market of global healthcare and the Korean government is striving to attract foreign patients. Nevertheless, there is a lack of effort to make foreign patients visiting Korea revisit Korea. Regarding foreign patients' medical disputes, these are not yet a problem officially; however, the government cannot leave the matter as it is. Medical dispute related with foreign patients is a highly complex issue due to different languages, nationalities, cultures, etc. Particularly, Korea's medical tourism is developed with Chinese visiting Korea for plastic surgery and cosmetic procedure. Thus, the Korean medical tourism market can be crowded with a lot of minor medical agencies, so-called brokers, getting foreign patients connected to the medical institutions. Consequently, Korea has received a large number of complaints and dissatisfaction. No one can predict and know what's supposed to happen in the future. Efforts of the Korean government and medical institute attracting foreign patients could be in vain. In order to take a step forward, this paper will do research on present conditions and look for strategies of improving this industry, focusing on the part of medical agency and contributing to the improvement of the Korean medical tourism industry.

• Journal of Korean society of Dental Hygiene
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• v.15 no.5
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• pp.857-863
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• 2015

Objectives: The purpose of the study is to investigate the awareness and activation towards dental medical tourism. Methods: A self-reported questionnaire was completed by 195 dental hygienists in Seoul from January 30 to September 15, 2014. Data were analyzed by one way ANOVA, chi square and t test using SPSS 19.0 program. the questionnaire consisted of general characteristics of the subjects, awareness towards medical tourism, medical tourism related hospitals, activation of Korean medical tourism, fields of medical tourism, and improvement of medical tourism. The questionnaire was adapted and modified from Kim and Kim by Likert scale. Results: Dental hygienists gave the high perception and possibility towards medical tourism (94.1%). Those carrying out medical tourism accounted for 39.5 percent. The most difficult problem was communication with foreigners (80.5%). The performance of prosthesis and anesthesia was the most specialized area that supported the medical tourism (84.1%). In order to improve the medical tourism implementation, dental medical technology must be strengthened (39.8%). Conclusion: The desirable dental medical tourism must be carried out by proficient dental medical manpower, higher technology, active participation and financial support by the government. This dental medical tourism will provide job opening for the dental hygienists.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
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• v.8 no.1
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• pp.69-78
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• 2013

Settled lifestyle as important to health and healing to medical tourism and wellness tourism in the 21st century has emerged as the best promising service industry. Jeju Island has a variety of local resources, and the directions was considered to spa industry promotion application it. Jeju Island has a variety of local resources which can be used for spa industry promotion. Jeju Island's beautiful natural environment, mineral resources, water resources, biological resources, agricultural products, traditional folk remedies available in Jeju's spa treatments. Using the local resources of Jeju, 'Jeju specialized spa treatments' can develop of 12 kinds of spa treatments. Namely, thalssotherapy, stone therapy, black sand poultice, hot-floored therapy using volcanic soil, thalassotherapy, drinking therapy, hydrotherapy, herbal/medicinal plants poultice, forest therapy, Spa cuisine, facial beauty, diet therapy. 12 kinds of Jeju specialized spa treatments development and service to the local resources of basic research on the physical and chemical characteristics, product development, clinical trials, efficacy studies should precede. In addition, customized spa services programs should be developed considering the propensity of customers, customer needs, and a spa type. And standardized program of spa services and need a manual painter. Medical tourism and wellness tourism in conjunction with efforts to be considered in order to increase the competitiveness of the spa industry in Jeju.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.15 no.4
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• pp.1895-1904
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• 2014

This study explores the way to improve service quality with the application of Service Blueprint and Analytic Hierarchy Process (hereafter, "AHP") in medical tourism. Service Blueprint has been widely accepted to identify the possible fail points in service delivery system, and AHP analysis has been recognized as beneficial method to rate relative importance in multi-criteria decision making process. We try to understand possible pitfalls to enhance Chinese medical tourists, and propose the priority in the resolution process. In the first step, we reviewed the extant literatures about medical tourism of South Korea, and built initial Service Blueprint. Experts who experienced service delivery process towards Chinese patients participated to review the proposed Service Blueprint in the second step. Thirdly, after extracting the possible fail points from revised Service Blueprint, we asked experts to guess the relative importance of Chinese patient by AHP methodology. Four domains (Arrival and Welcoming, Hospitalization, Process before, operations, and after surgery, Recovery and discharge) were emerged with detail criteria. Results show that operations and treatment is the most important domain not to lose Chinese patient's loyalty with following hospitalization process domain. Also, we suggest the priority among sixteen criteria to prevent service failure.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.24 no.4
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• pp.367-379
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• 2014

Background: Over the last decade, medical tourism industry has grown in Korea. Especially the number of Mongolian medical tourists has increased rapidly. Therefore, the Mongolia is one of the targets for Korea medical tourism. The purpose of this study is to investigate the effects of destination image and expected attributes of medical services on Mongolian's intention to use Korean medical tourism service. Methods: This study empirically collected survey data from Mongolian lived in Mongolia. The study analyzed the data using a PLS model. Results: Our results are as follows. First, the country image didn't significantly have causal effects on expected medical service quality and perceived risk. Second, tourism image (e.g., entertainment, economic feasibility, and local convenience) has significantly causal effects on expected medical service quality and perceived risk. However, tourist site as tourism image didn't significantly have causal effects on expected medical service quality and perceived risk. Third, medical image made a statistically significant effect on expected medical service quality and perceived risk. Fourth, the expected medical service quality showed a significant effect on intention to use Korean medical tourism service. Fifth, the perceived risk of medical tourism showed a significant effect on the reliability of medical tourism, but didn't show a significant effect on the intention to use Korean medical tourism service. Finally, the reliability has a significant effect on the intention to use Korean medical tourism service. Conclusion: From our empirical results, this study concluded that as a strategy attracting Mongolian patients, it is more effective to strengthen Korean hospital image and tourism image than Korean country image.

• Korean Journal of Occupational Health Nursing
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• v.32 no.3
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• pp.89-98
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• 2023

Purpose: This study proposes preventive strategies for factors affecting the work impairment of international medical tourism coordinators. Methods: Data for this study were collected via an online questionnaire survey involving 296 international medical tourism coordinators in South Korea, considering the impact coronavirus disease 2019. The survey was conducted from 25th April 2022 to 22nd July 2022 and data were analyzed SPSS/WINdows software version 22, including statistical, reliability, factor and regression analyses. Results: This study focused on occupational stress, health problems and job efficacy among international medical tourism coordinators in medical tourism research. The main objective was to examine the factors that influenced their work impairment. Conclusion: This study emphasizes the importance of factors such as occupational stress, health problems and job efficacy in influencing work impairment among international medical tourism coordinators. The identified factors account for 30% of explanation power. An intervention program tailored to the characteristics of domestic and international medical tourism coordinators is recommended.

• Journal of Korea Entertainment Industry Association
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• v.14 no.4
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• pp.91-104
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• 2020

In this study, the value of the medical resort was divided into hedonic value, hospitality value, safety and personal information protection value, and profitability value by exploring and typifying the successful cases and related services of the medical resort in order to provide the direction of development and policy implications of the medical resort for the medical tourism industry. For those who have used the medical resort, I wanted to verify the impact of the value of medical resort on perception of medical resort and its intention to use it. As a result of this study, it was found that hedonic value and hospitality value of medical resort have a strong influence on usefulness perception and well-being perception of medical resort, that safety and personal information protection value of medical resort was only affected by usefulness perception, and profit value of medical resort was only affected by well-being perception. In addition, the usefulness perception and well-being perception of medical resorts were shown to have an impact on the intention of using medical resorts, especially in the case of well-being perception of medical resorts. The above findings are meaningful in that they expanded the medical resort-related research area for the medical tourism industry and provided useful implications for the development of medical resorts that meet the convenience and needs of medical tourists.