Mobile Information Systems: An Empirical Analysis of the Determinants of Mobile Commerce Acceptance in Jordan

Although mobile commerce have been used and widely researched in developed nations, there is a low usage in the Arab world. Also, there is a limited empirical research on mobile commerce in Jordan despite the high penetration of mobile phone subscribers in 2009. Among the aims of this quantitative research is to empirically investigate the determinants of mobile commerce adoption in a collectivist culture such as Jordan where social norms are valued and individual actions are influenced greatly by important reference groups. The Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) is extended to include four factors (facilitating conditions, cost, personal innovativeness in IT (PIIT) and subjective norms). Furthermore, in order to understand subjective norms in collectivist culture; subjective norms were decomposed into different levels (personal and societal injunctive and descriptive norms). The research framework consists of twelve latent variables (seven exogenous and five endogenous). Using self-administered survey, 40 items with 7-point Likert scale is used to collect data. Out of the 500 samples, 448 responses (89.6 % response rate) were collected; eventually 401 responses were usable. Structural Equation Modeling is applied to analyze the data. The findings of this study revealed that facilitating conditions, cost, PIIT, attitude and perceived usefulness are significant determinants of behavioral intention in Jordan. In addition, subjective norms, facilitating conditions, cost and perceived ease of use are significant antecedents of attitude which in turn influencing behavioral intention. Moreover, the empirical evidence indicated that personal injunctive norm, personal descriptive norm and societal injunctive norm are indeed antecedents of subjective norms. It can be concluded that extended TAM successfully enriched the model and increased the exploratory power to 53% in explaining behavioral intention variance

Global economic burden of unmet surgical need for appendicitis

Background There is a substantial gap in provision of adequate surgical care in many low- and middle-income countries. This study aimed to identify the economic burden of unmet surgical need for the common condition of appendicitis. Methods Data on the incidence of appendicitis from 170 countries and two different approaches were used to estimate numbers of patients who do not receive surgery: as a fixed proportion of the total unmet surgical need per country (approach 1); and based on country income status (approach 2). Indirect costs with current levels of access and local quality, and those if quality were at the standards of high-income countries, were estimated. A human capital approach was applied, focusing on the economic burden resulting from premature death and absenteeism. Results Excess mortality was 4185 per 100 000 cases of appendicitis using approach 1 and 3448 per 100 000 using approach 2. The economic burden of continuing current levels of access and local quality was US $92 492 million using approach 1 and$73 141 million using approach 2. The economic burden of not providing surgical care to the standards of high-income countries was $95 004 million using approach 1 and$75 666 million using approach 2. The largest share of these costs resulted from premature death (97.7 per cent) and lack of access (97.0 per cent) in contrast to lack of quality. Conclusion For a comparatively non-complex emergency condition such as appendicitis, increasing access to care should be prioritized. Although improving quality of care should not be neglected, increasing provision of care at current standards could reduce societal costs substantially