Theses (Master of Business Administration in Healthcare Management)

This paper presents a rigorous academic deconstruction and strategic evaluation of the Agile Viva Active-Aging LifeHub business plan, situated within the context of Malaysia's accelerating demographic transition and evolving aged-care ecosystem. Employing lenses from gerontology, health systems management, business model innovation, and behavioural economics, the analysis dissects the venture's foundational thesis, operational model, and market positioning. It identifies a convergent "perfect storm" of demographic pressure, systemic service gaps, and policy tailwinds that validate the model's necessity. The interpretation section critically examines the venture's core hypotheses which particularly the integration of play therapy and a hybrid clinical-wellness model that against empirical evidence and cultural-economic realities in Malaysia. Subsequently, the paper proposes a detailed, phased strategic roadmap for growth, embedding sustainability through clinical governance and financial resilience, and achieving scalability via technological enablement and ecosystem orchestration. This work contributes to the literature on social enterprise models in ageing societies and provides a replicable framework for evidence-based, scalable preventive health interventions in emerging economies.

Malaysia is rapidly transitioning into an ageing society, creating an urgent demand for structured, community-based eldercare services that balance health monitoring with social vitality. This business plan proposes the establishment of The Ranyai House: Elder Living and Care Centre, a mid-range elderly daycare centre in Kuching, Sarawak, defined by its Unique Selling Proposition (USP): The "Intergenerational Bridge." Operating through a "Shared Campus" model, the centre partners with an existing local preschool to foster supervised interactions between “grandparent figures” and children. This strategy is designed to enhance cognitive resilience and emotional well-being in older adults while providing a lean operational strategy that leverages existing preschool infrastructure to mitigate high startup costs. Financial projections indicate a break-even between Years 1 and 2, with a projected Net Income of RM308,195 by Year 5 through strategic tiered pricing. Beyond its practical implementation, this study contributes to the field of healthcare management by providing a validated framework for intergenerational solidarity as a strategic resource in community-based care. It extends the Social Exchange Theory by demonstrating how structured non-familial interactions can activate social participation and create a “responsibility-reward” equilibrium that alleviates pressure on the broader national healthcare system. To further solidify the strategic positioning of The Ranyai House, the Continuum of Care model is integrated, demonstrating how the cenre bridges the gap between independent living and high-intensity clinical care, providing a vital mid-point for Kuching’s ageing population. Furthermore, this work offers an original “Partner-Bridge” typology, providing a scalable model for ageing-in-place that addresses the socio-emotional needs of seniors while fostering intergenerational empathy, offering a theoretical foundation for future family-friendly ageing policies in developing nations. Guided by the WHO Integrated Care for Older People (ICOPE) framework and the Active Ageing Policy, The Ranyai House establishes a sustainable blueprint for community-integrated care that honours seniors as vital members of society, ensuring they age with purpose, dignity, and joy.

The quantification or description of people's use of healthcare services for the aim of preventing and curing health issues, improving health and well-being, or obtaining information about their condition and prognosis of health is known as healthcare utilisation. Population ageing is a widespread, global phenomena with societal and national consequences. To deal with this demographic trend, there is a necessity for more financial resources to be allocated to healthcare services. A previous study carried out in Malaysia on healthcare utilization among older persons was focused on Northern region only but not in the southern region. Utilization of outpatient services and in-patient services among older persons is not documented in the Johor region unlike northern region of Malaysia. Hence, the objective of this study was to investigate the factors that influence healthcare utilization among older persons in Johor region using Andersen’s behavioural model. A survey was carried out among those aged 65 and above in urban and rural region of Johor. Inpatient care was significantly justified by predisposing, enabling and need factors while outpatient care was more significantly justified by predisposing factor as well as need factor than enabling factor. Theoretical and practical implications for delivering health services to older persons in Johor are proposed in this study. Additionally, assessing the general characteristics of older persons by focusing on their health-care utilisation gives information for developing health-care programs and policies in light of the recent rise in health-care concerns. Keywords: Healthcare utilization; Predisposing factors; Enabling factors; Need factors;

Sejahtera Care is a digital health venture that is strategically designed to address the growing ageing population in Malaysia and to deal with the escalating and unsustainable cost burden of non-communicable diseases (NCDs). Based on the principle of value based care (VBC), this company aims to transition from the reactive fee-for-service (FFS) model that incentivises volume to a proactive outcome-driven system that incentivises the reduction of total cost of care (TCoC). These rise in NCDs and the projected increase in the number of elderly people in Malaysia has created a fragmentation gap which is the lack of continuity of care and coordination between public hospitals, private specialists and daily life at home leading to high rates of preventable emergency room visits or readmissions. This situation has led to a rising number of claims which is financially crippling for private payors (PwC, 2021). Therefore, the primary market opportunity for Sejahtera Care is to provide a peace of mind to the high-spending caregivers and cost containment to business-to-business (B2B) partners like insurers and corporations. With Sejahtera Care, an integrated solution is delivered based on the Chronic Care Model (CCM): a) High-technology platform: This platform targets the elderly geriatric population, who will be connected to a remote patient monitoring (RPM) kit that will relay vital signs data in real-time to the artificial intelligence (AI)-driven clinical decision system of Sejahtera Care. Here, the algorithms will then risk-stratify patients and identify critical trends for immediate action. b) High-touch service: The clinical command centre of Sejahtera Care that is staffed by experienced care coordinators will be responsible for transforming raw data and alerts into proactive human intervention. The human triage system is the competitive advantage of this company that will translate date into validated clinical outcomes, preventing patients from reaching a point of crisis requiring emergency care.