Impact of Technology Transfer on the Quality of Care in Moroccan Healthcare Institutions

Abstract

This article examines the influence of technology transfer on healthcare quality in Moroccan healthcare institutions, jointly testing the mediating role of digital health innovation and the moderating role of organizational absorptive capacity. Data were collected through a structured questionnaire administered to 200 healthcare professionals (hospital directors, physicians, nursing managers, quality officers, and information-system managers) across university hospitals, public hospitals, private clinics, and health centres in Morocco, and analysed using a variance-based structural modelling approach (composite scores, standardized regression, and bootstrapping) consistent with PLS-SEM logic [1]. The measurement model shows satisfactory reliability and convergent validity (Cronbach’s alpha ranging from 0.887 to 0.928; AVE ranging from 0.689 to 0.776), although discriminant validity among the antecedent constructs remains limited, warranting cautious interpretation of construct-specific effects. The structural model explains a substantial share of variance in technology transfer (R² = 0.852), digital health innovation (R² = 0.807), and healthcare quality (R² = 0.876). Training, leadership, digital infrastructure, and university-hospital partnerships each positively and significantly predict technology transfer, which in turn positively affects digital health innovation; digital innovation positively affects healthcare quality and partially mediates the technology transfer-quality relationship. However, the hypothesized moderating effect of absorptive capacity on the technology transfer-innovation link is not statistically supported. The study offers one of the few joint empirical tests of the TOE framework, the Resource-Based View, and absorptive capacity theory in the Moroccan hospital sector, and transparently discusses discriminant-validity limitations often left unaddressed in comparable studies.