ReviewBMJ open2023
Eliciting primary healthcare physicians' preferences for job characteristics in rural China: a discrete choice experiment.
Review in BMJ open, 2023. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 10 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
10 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- The Evolving Landscape of Discrete Choice Experiments in Health Economics: A Systematic Review.PharmacoEconomics · 2025Pooled it
- What drives family physicians to rural practice? A discrete choice experiment in Vietnam.Health policy OPEN · 2026Article
- Assessing the job preferences of public health specialist doctors: a discrete choice experiment.Primary health care research & development · 2026Article
- Job preferences and trade-offs in rural health workforce retention: a discrete choice experiment from western China.Health policy and planning · 2026Article
- Heterogeneity in job preferences among young physicians in Chinese tertiary hospitals: a discrete choice experiment.BMJ open · 2026Article
- Patient preferences for pancreatic cancer treatment (PERSEUS): a multicenter discrete choice experiment.Health and quality of life outcomes · 2025Article
- Comparative differences in job preferences among doctors in different levels of public hospitals in Henan, China: a discrete choice experiment.Frontiers in psychology · 2025Article
- Incentive affects physicians' willingness to continue participating in urban-rural medical consortia: a comparative study of county and provincial hospitals in Central China.BMC health services research · 2024Article
- Job preferences of master public health candidates in Northeast China based on discrete choice experiments.BMC health services research · 2024Article
- Regional differences in health resource allocation: a longitudinal study in the Chengdu-Chongqing economic circle, China.BMJ open · 2024Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
introductionThe outflow and scarcity of physicians in rural areas can adversely affect universal health coverage and population health outcomes, which are critical concerns in China. This study explored primary healthcare physicians' job preferences using a discrete choice experiment to identify appropriate incentives for retention.
methodsEight job characteristics were identified through a literature review and qualitative studies as the attributes relevant to designing the discrete choice experiment, with levels varying between two hypothetical jobs. The data were analysed using conditional logit model, mixed logit model and latent class model.
resultsA total of 1781 licensed physicians (including licensed assistant physicians) from township health centres in rural areas were surveyed. Policy simulation suggested that they were sensitive to both monetary and non-monetary policy incentives. As for non-monetary job characteristics, a highly intense doctor-patient relationship, bianzhi (the number of personnel allocated to each employer by the government) and educational opportunities were highly valued by the respondents. The latent class model could identify distinct groups with different job preferences according to their memberships.
conclusionUrban jobs were much preferred to rural ones. However, policy incentives can lend themselves to effective retention strategies. It is also important to tailor policy incentives to different subgroups.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.