Influence of Internet dissemination on hospital selection for benign surgical disease: A single center retrospective study.

The Internet is used worldwide, but its effect on hospital selection of minor surgical disease has not hitherto been thoroughly studied. To investigate the effect of the Internet dissemination on hospital selection of minor surgical disease and information affecting selection, we conducted a survey of patients who underwent laparoscopic surgery from January 2016 to April 2017. We analyzed the questionnaire responses of 1916 patients. Over 80% of patients in all groups selected the hospital based on Internet information. Among patients aged over 60 years, 65.1% selected the hospital based on Internet information. With regard to hospital selection factors, the highest number of responses was for sophisticated surgical treatment (93.1%). The second highest was for a simplified medical care system (33.0%); third was a comprehensive nursing care system (18.1%). Among responses about surgical treatment, the most were obtained for short operation time and fewer hospitalization days (81.5%).