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This study aims to provides the insights on the advantages and disadvantages of international franchising and licensing from the perspectives of legal and business considerations in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC).

Using a quantitative research approach, the authors conducted a survey with 150 business owners and franchisees in the GCC and analyzed the data using descriptive statistics, structural equation modeling and frequency analysis.

The findings reveal that while international franchising and licensing offer significant benefits for business expansion and revenue growth, they also pose risks related to legal compliance, cultural differences and intellectual property protection. Indeed, the results of this study provide valuable insights into the advantages and disadvantages of international franchising and licensing in the GCC from both legal and business perspectives.

There is limited research on the legal and business perspectives of international franchising and licensing in the GCC. This study contributes to the literature by providing a comprehensive analysis of the legal and business perspectives of international franchising and licensing in the GCC.

Online health question-and-answer (Q&A) forums have developed a new business model whereby listeners (peer patients) can pay to read health information derived from consultations between askers (focal patients) and answerers (physicians). However, research exploring the mechanism behind peer patients' purchase decisions and the specific nature of the information driving these decisions has remained limited. This study aims to develop a theoretical model for understanding how peer patients make such decisions based on limited information, i.e. the first question displayed in each focal patient-physician interaction record, considering argument quality (interrogative form and information details) and source credibility (patient experience of focal patients), including the contingent role of urgency.

The model was tested by text mining 1,960 consultation records from a popular Chinese online health Q&A forum on the Yilu App. These records involved interactions between focal patients and physicians and were purchased by 447,718 peer patients seeking health-related information until this research.

Patient experience embedded in focal patients' questions plays a significant role in inducing peer patients to purchase previous consultation records featuring exchanges between focal patients and physicians; in particular, increasingly detailed information is associated with a reduced probability of making a purchase. When focal patients demonstrate a high level of urgency, the effect of information details is weakened, while the interrogative form is strengthened.

The originality of this study lies in its exploration of the monetization mechanism forming the trilateral relationship between askers (focal patients), answerers (physicians) and listeners (peer patients) in the business model “paying to view others' answers” in the online health Q&A forum and the moderating role of urgency in explaining the mechanism of how first questions influence peer patients' purchasing behavior.

This study aims to examine the impact of digital health technology adoption on female physicians’ work–life balance (WLB) in Bahrain. This study also examines the impact of two moderating variables: career stage, based on the kaleidoscope career model (KCM) and the presence of domestic workers, based on Becker’s theory of the allocation of time.

An electronic quantitative survey was administered to female physicians working in Bahrain. The survey gathered data on various aspects of digital health technology, WLB and demographic characteristics such as age and the presence of domestic workers. From a target population of approximately 1,000 female physicians in Bahrain, 102 participated in the survey.

The authors found that the effect of digital health technologies on WLB is positive in general and specifically for the early-career stage; however, it harms WLB in the middle and late-career stages. This is consistent with KCM predictions. In addition, there is no moderating effect of having domestic helpers.

This paper contributes to the theoretical understanding of the effect of technology on WLB by expanding the traditional model (KCM) to include an economic model of how female physicians allocate their time between work and home responsibilities, including the effect that a domestic worker can have on this allocation. Beyond these theoretical contributions, this paper is also the first to study technology and WLB in the health sector in Bahrain following the COVID-19 pandemic.

This study aims to investigate the prevalence of cosmetic surgery and its relationship with the level of mental health and socioeconomic variables in Sulaymaniyah city in Iraq.

This descriptive-analytical and cross-sectional study was conducted on 941 subjects who were selected using multistage sampling method. Data were collected using a checklist as well as a questionnaire. Data analysis was done using chi-square test and multiple logistic regression model using Stata software version 20.

The prevalence of cosmetic surgery was 13.4% (female: 17.5%; male: 8.2%). The most common types of cosmetic surgery were rhinoplasty (7.6%) in women and hair transplant (5.5%) in men. Overall, rhinoplasty (7.6%) was the most common type of cosmetic surgery among both groups. In total, the prevalence of having symptoms of mental disorders was 34.5% and it was significantly higher among people with a history of cosmetic surgery (65.1%) than those without any experience of having cosmetic surgery (29.8%) (p < 0.001). Being female (odds ratio [OR] = 2.07; 95% confidence interval [CI]: 1.33–3.22), having mild symptoms of mental disorders (OR = 2.76; 95% CI: 1.71–4.47) and having moderate or severe symptoms of mental disorders (OR = 7.48; 95% CI: 4.60–12.29) were among the important variables that could affect performing cosmetic surgery.

The prevalence of cosmetic surgery in Sulaymaniyah is high, and based on the findings of this study, gender and mental health status are effective factors in this regard. Designing targeted interventions is suggested with an emphasis on the findings of this study to reduce the rate of cosmetic surgeries.