An Empirical Study of Home Healthcare Robots Adoption Using the UTUAT Model

Home healthcare initiatives are aimed to reduce readmission costs, transportation costs, and hospital medical errors, and to improve post hospitalization healthcare quality, and enhance patient home independency. Today, it is almost unimaginable to consider this initiative without information technology. Home healthcare robots are one type of the emerging technologies that hold promise for making clinical information available at the right place and right time. Several robots have been developed to facilitate home healthcare such as remote presence robots (e.g., RP2) and Paro. Most previous research focus on technical and implementation issues of home healthcare robots, there is a need to understand the factors that influence their adoption. This research aims to fill this knowledge gap by applying the UTAUT model. The model was tested using survey questionnaire. The empirical results confirm that performance expectancy, social influence, and facilitating condition directly affect usage intention of home healthcare robots, while effort expectancy indirectly affects usage intention through performance expectancy. Several practical and theoretical implications are also discussed.