Research on incentive policies of medical information sharing of Medical Consortium in China based on the principal-agent theory

Medical information sharing is an important part in effective use of medical resources. However, some hospitals are unwilling to share their medical information or use other hospitals' medical information in self-interest in China. Thus, a government's incentive policy can lead hospitals to step up their efforts in sharing medical information. In this paper, based on the principal-agent theory, we constructed a multi-stage medical information-sharing incentive model regarding to the problem of the Medical Consortium in China. In the model, we consider hospitals can be risk-neutral or risk-averse to some random factors. We also propose the concepts of information complementarity and information usability to measure the attributes of information used and shared by hospitals. Through analytical and numerical analysis, the optimal incentive policy is presented, correlations between Chinese government's incentive coefficient and hospitals' features are discussed and some suggestions are given to the government.