近年來口碑議題的研究相當盛行，但有關醫療產業的口碑研究卻鮮少出現。本研究主要針對病患就醫前的資訊搜尋行為，希望了解口碑在病患進行醫療決策時，所扮演的角色及受重視的程度。我們也將探討病患對醫療決策的重視程度，及決策時重視的因素為何。
本研究主要發現：第一、有六成以上的病患在做醫療決策時，仰賴口碑推薦，口碑仍為病患的主要資訊來源；第二、消費者在選擇醫院時最重視的醫院因素為「設備」，這代表了醫療院所必須要定期更新，或者添購更先進的醫療設備儀器；第三，主動搜尋資訊的病患，主要搜尋內容為較無形因素，如醫院的「風評」、「服務」及「名氣」，這表示了醫院要更加精進提升這些項目的滿意度；第四，我們發現主動搜尋資訊的病患特徵並不相同，如醫院資訊主動搜尋者多為男性，而醫生則為女性；第五，我們發現病患重視網路上的醫療資訊，但卻難以取得的窘境，因此鼓勵醫院可在網路上提供相關資源。

Although there are many studies about word of mouth in recent years, only few literatures review papers about WOM in health care service industry. This paper investigates the patients’ information searching behavior before making medical decisions and hopes to understand what kind of role do WOM play when patients making medical decisions. This paper also investigates the importance of medical decision-making for patients and what the important decision-making factors are.
The research result can be concluded as blow:
1. More than 60% of patients rely on word-of-mouth when making medical decisions.
2. Facility is the most important factor that influencing consumer to choosing hospital, it means that hospital should purchase newly medical facilities and equipments regularly.
3. Patients who are actively searching information pay more attention on invisible factors, such as the reputation, the service or the prestige of hospital.
4. We found that patients who are actively searching information have different characteristics, for example males are actively seeking information on hospitals, and females are actively seeking information on doctors.
5. Our finding suggests that hospital should provide more information on the internet that patients care about but hard to obtain it.

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