21 / 2024-04-11 10:49:36

Blind Assignment or Informed Assignment: Exploring the Role of Patient Information in Optimizing Telehealth Services

telehealth platform,patient information,patient assignment,doctor staffing,queues

This paper examines the influence of collecting patient information in enhancing the efficiency of patient-doctor matching on telehealth platforms. We model a telehealth platform that services a diverse patient population with two types of doctors: regular and superior doctor services. We use two information scenarios — blind assignment and informed assignment — to represent different levels of patient information collection. We analyze the efficiency effect of patient information from two angles: maximizing total social welfare and patient surplus. Our findings suggest that collecting more patient information does not necessarily improve social welfare. The optimal level of information collection depends on the disparity in doctor quality and the cost of information collection. This study contributes to the theoretical understanding of the effects of patient information on patient-doctor assignment and doctor capacity design in a two-tier telehealth platform. It also provides practical insights for telehealth platforms in determining their information structure.