engleski

Health tourism development research framework at the destination level

Purpose – The purpose of the paper is to set up a framework for research aimed at raising the quality and competitiveness of health tourism services at the tourism destination. The Kvarner tourism destination was chosen for the model at the national level due to its long tradition and highest potential for health tourism development, following the Croatian strategic documents (CTDS 2013, 35), Design – After the introduction, relevant research background as well as the literature review is presented. Both of them are applied in the research conducted on the Kvarner tourism destination. Research questions follow, after which research results are discussed. The outcomes of the research are presented in the conclusion. Methodology – For this purpose, especially created questionnaire was prepared. The survey was conducted from the end of 2017 till the beginning of 2018 on the representative sample of Kvarner health-tourism and tourism institutions as a target group. They include health spas, special hospitals, wellness/spa hotels, wellness centers at the destination, dental and medical clinics, tourism organizations et al. Approach – The main approach is in estimating the assumptions for improving the quality and competitiveness of health-tourism services in Kvarner tourism destination Findings – Despite the potentials and assumptions for health-tourism development, the Kvarner tourism destination needs to make additional efforts to reach the health-tourism trends in order to raise the level of recognisability on the health-tourism market. Originality of the research – The methodological framework was originally defined for this research with the aim of its successful application in the similar tourism destination with healthtourism orientation, in theoretical as well as in the practical sense.

Health-tourism ; Tourism destination ; Competitiveness ; Quality ; Croatia, ; Kvarner

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