IntroductionIn many countries, a reassessment of afterhours primary care has become necessary. In particular, centralised general practitioner deputizing services (GPDS) have emerged. In this study, consumers' preferences for after-hours medical care were obtained and the use of the new GPDS was predicted. Method On the basis of the Theory of Reasoned Action, a survey was developed that was used at the Free Newborn and Child health care services in Antwerp. Consumers were asked about their knowledge, experience and perceptions concerning the performance of different medical services. Results 350 questionnaires were used for analysis. 98.6% of the respondents knew about the existence of the emergency department, whereas the GPDS was known by 81.7% of the respondents. The main reasons for preferring emergency department over the other services were an easy access, good explanation by the doctor and a late due time of the payment. Respondents preferred the GPDS mainly because of an expected shorter waiting time. Experience had a strong positive influence on choosing a particular after-hours medical service. Conclusion In our study, the consumers' preferences concerning after-hours medical care were assessed. The following items are crucial for choosing after-hours care: experience with the services, easy access to the service, explanation by the doctor about the illness and the treatment and waiting time.An overhaul of after-hours primary care has become necessary in many countries. In the future the availability of primary care will decrease due to an overall decreasing number of general practitioners (GPs), feminisation of the profession, working part-time and a decrease of young doctors choosing general practice.1e7 The overall result is an increasing workload for GPs. The concept of individual or small groups of GPs offering 24-h care is no longer feasible.Moreover, the increase of the workload of emergency departments (EDs) is remarkable. EDs show many characteristics of a primary care service, and people visit the ED with problems that can be solved by a GP. Inappropriate use of the ED may distract this service from real medical urgencies. In some countries there is a tendency to centralise after-hours services of GPs. The concept of large-scale general practitioner deputizing services (GPDS) is almost uniformly used in The Netherlands, 11 Denmark, 12 13 Norway 14 and in the UK.15e17 Concerns have been raised as to whether large-scale GPDS would lead to equally good patient care as the former small-scale model. 18 It is of particular interest if there is free access to all the medical services and if the primary care can be easily bypassed. Large-scale GPDS, when less appreciated by the patient, could lead to extra transfers of patients from general practice to secondary care alternatives, such as the ED.In Belgium, with a free access to ED and most medical specialities, GPDS have emerged. In this article, we analyse consumers' experiences with the available services, the importance of service attrib...

Logical consistency of market share models has received considerable attention in the recent marketing literature. The reports suggest that, at least theoretically, attraction-type specifications are more easily justified than the ones commonly used in empirical work. The authors examine whether the theoretical superiority also implies a better predictive performance. The empirical results give a tentatively affirmative answer.

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This study quantifies the adoption of a new medical service. As a result, it extends current research approaches on eliciting and matching patient's needs and assists policy makers in establishing adequate service capacities.