Four Party Game Model Construction of “Health+” Hierarchical Diagnosis and Treatment with Home Healthcare Agencies

Wendi Li; Gang Du; Xiaohang Yue

doi:10.1007/s11518-025-5692-6

Journal of Systems Science and Systems Engineering ›› :1 -39. DOI: 10.1007/s11518-025-5692-6

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Four Party Game Model Construction of “Health+” Hierarchical Diagnosis and Treatment with Home Healthcare Agencies

Wendi Li ¹
, Gang Du ¹^,²^,³^,^a
, Xiaohang Yue ⁴

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¹ School of Economics and Management, East China Normal University, 200062, Shanghai, China

² Key Laboratory of Advanced Theory and Application in Statistics and Data Science, Ministry of Education, 200062, Shanghai, China

³ Chongqing Key Laboratory of Precision Optics, Chongqing Institute of East China Normal University, 401120, Chongqing, China

⁴ Lubar School of Business, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, 53201, Milwaukee, WI, USA

Corresponding author:

^a gdu@dbm.ecnu.edu.cn

Wendi Li is currently a PhD candidate, studying at East China Normal University, with research focus on logistics and supply chain management

Gang Du is currently a professor with the School of Economics and Management, East China Normal University. He was a research fellow with the National University of Singapore from 2011 to 2013. His work has been published in leading economic and management journals. His research interests include supply chain management, human-computer interaction, human-artificial intelligence collaboration.

Xiaohang Yue is a professor of supply chain operations management with the Lubar College of Business, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Milwaukee, WI, USA. He has published in leading journals like Operations Research, Information Systems Research, and Production and Operations Management, etc.

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Abstract

The primary task in safeguarding health is preventing disease before it occurs, that is, reducing the incidence of disease through disease prevention and health management. To address the issues of disease prevention and difficulty in accessing medical care, this paper proposes introducing private home healthcare agencies to establish a public health co-governance system. By constructing a four-party evolutionary game model involving the healthcare system, home healthcare agencies, government departments, and the public, we can identify the factors influencing the strategy choices of each entity and determine stable strategy combinations. Research findings: 1) When the costs associated with actively supporting the “health+” hierarchical diagnosis and treatment are lower than those of substandard services compared to high-quality services, and the costs required for public acceptance are below the critical threshold, it is possible to ensure that the healthcare system, home healthcare agencies, and the public adopt beneficial strategies. 2) In some cases, government departments cannot effectively avoid the undesirable state from becoming a stable equilibrium no matter what supervision strategies they adopt, and it depends critically on the costs and benefits under different strategies of each party. 3) Active cooperation among the healthcare service system, home healthcare agencies and the public can reduce the probability of governmental supervision strategies, and governmental monitor is not necessary when the “health+” hierarchical diagnosis and treatment system works optimally. The study can provide a theoretical basis and reference for the government to improve family disease prevention capabilities and improve the hierarchical diagnosis and treatment system.

Keywords

Health management / disease prevention / home healthcare / hierarchical diagnosis and treatment / quadripartite evolutionary game

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Wendi Li, Gang Du, Xiaohang Yue. Four Party Game Model Construction of “Health+” Hierarchical Diagnosis and Treatment with Home Healthcare Agencies. Journal of Systems Science and Systems Engineering 1-39 DOI:10.1007/s11518-025-5692-6

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