Objective: To quantify differences in patient expectations of healthscape (e.g., interior environment) across Western medicine (WM) and Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) paradigms. Data sources/study setting: Primary survey data comprise 469 Taiwanese consumers. National insurance coverage of both TCM and WM is an ideal setting to test for differences in healthscape expectations. Study design: Respondents report their recent experience as either exclusive users of TCM, exclusive WM, neither, or dual usage (both TCM and WM), and are randomly assigned to one of two surveys (identical except one refers to WM contexts, the other TCM) to rate the importance of 28 healthscape factors derived from previous studies. Data collection/extraction methods: Multivariate analysis of variance is used to test the research hypotheses. Principal findings: Dual users accept some differences across paradigms. In contrast, exclusive WM users apply their existing WM expectations to TCM contexts, raising the possibility of dissatisfaction and low adoption. Conclusions: A person's experience with TCM is related to acceptance of healthscape differences. Medical service providers of TCM, and by extension complementary and alternative medicine, should devise strategies to ease initial visitation by exclusive WM users. Healthscape designs need not be modeled closely on a WM standard, as dual users accept differences.
Keywords: CAM; TCM; healthscape; service expectations; traditional medicine.