Physicians’ loyalty to branded medicines in low-middle-income countries: A structural equation modeling

Abstract

Objective As gatekeepers in health continuum, physicians play a pivotal role in persuading patients to consume a specific medicine, and their prescription behavior has a great effect on both healthcare costs and pharmaceutical markets. Taking the important role of physicians in healthcare system into account, in this study we have tried to empirically prioritize those factors that affect physicians’ loyalty behavior in prescribing branded medicines. Methods This research is grounded on a survey through which 437 specialist physicians were randomly invited to fill out the questionnaire of the survey. Structural Equation Modeling was performed to evaluate the research model and to test the research hypotheses. In addition to demographic section, six measures were used to evaluate the prescription behavior of physicians in terms of loyalty. Key findings The results revealed that there are some factors influencing physicians’ loyalty to branded medicines, among which professional influence is perceived to be the most important factor as compared with others. In contrast, the results rejected this hypothesis that promotional tools such as tangible rewards have a significant effect on physicians’ loyalty behavior. Conclusions The results contribute to the pharmaceutical companies endeavoring to develop fair, ethical, and effective marketing strategies to increase physicians’ loyalty to their products. Furthermore, by comparing the results of similar studies, this research has shed light on this fact that influencing factors on brand loyalty may be different across countries over the world.