Public hospitals’ risk communication strategies during COVID-19

This exploratory study analyses studies pertaining to the risk communication strategies adopted by Spanish public hospitals to inform their stakeholders during the first COVID-19 wave, in order to better understand effective communication of ‘health messages’ during a pandemic. After reviewing 155 academic works, 12 articles that were published between January 2020 and September 2020 met full inclusion criteria. Implementing a thematic synthesis approach yielded five themes: (1) transparency of crisis; (2) hospital health leadership crisis; (3) crisis management communication; (4) crisis management strategy; and (5) crisis management stakeholders. Based on these identified themes, 10 evidence-based recommendations for hospital communication preparedness and implementation during health crises are offered.