Communication as a Transmitter of Trust in Healthcare Network During Pandemic

The notion of the article has evolved from the analysis of governance network performance. Healthcare system is an example of a governance network, complex system of relations aimed at satisfying societal healthcare needs. Over the past years, the healthcare system in Poland has undergone many changes most focused on the structure and financing. The article addresses the issue of communication and trust among the healthcare institutional providers and healthcare authorities. The research study was conducted in 2020 in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic in one of the hospitals in Poland. The research question: how communication affects trust, led to development of multi-layered questionnaire attempting to assess inter-institutional relations in healthcare network. The study used a quantitative study, namely a linear regression model run with a dependent variable trust. This study adds a valuable contribution to the healthcare theory by analysing communication and trust issues from a system-wide approach, as research particularly quantitative rarely focuses on healthcare network as a whole. As the study results show building quality relations among the healthcare institutions is one of the essential building blocks of system-wide trust in the healthcare system.