Analyzing Patient Value by Modifying RFM Model With Consideration of The Limitation of Service Throughput: An Investigation of Dental Health Care

The Requency-Frequency-Monetary (RFM) model was commonly used to describe customer value. However, there are some deficiency in the RFM model and should be overcame. This study proposed a new concept of customer value analysis in the service system of health care with consideration of the limitation of service throughput. We proposed a modified RFM model and focused on the adjustment of the Monetary measure which took account of the length of customer stay. In this study, the proposed model was applied to dental care service, and the customers’ value are measured more accurate and more approaching to the characteristics of the service system. Patient segmentation was performed by integrated customer value matrix and traditional/modified RFM model. The results of this study show that the number of patients, the average age, and the average treatment duration of the target patient segment obtained from the proposed FRM model were slightly reduced, but the average monetary and average modified monetary were superior to those of the target patients obtained from the traditional RFM model. The results indicated that the modified model proposed by this study performs more objective and effective segmentation of target patients.