Healthcare organizational resilience before COVID-19

Resiliencia organizacional sanitaria

Abstract

Healthcare organizational resilience is a key issue to face sudden or chronic crises, through planning and adaptive capacity. The present exploratory study aimed to describe the organizational resilience perceived by 325 healthcare workers in Barcelona before the COVID-19 pandemic. Participants perceived their respective hospitals as organizations with medium resilience, with greater capacity for crisis planning than for adaptive capacity after crises.  The main resilience strengths were the belief that emergency plans should be practiced and the importance of staff teamwork in response to crises. Lack of awareness about recovery priorities and lack of innovation in problem solving were identified as main weaknesses. Significant differences were found by sociodemographic groups which could be relevant for the design of intervention plans. The findings are even more meaningful after the COVID-19 pandemic occurred, representing a unique baseline for future studies.

Key words: Organizational resilience, planning, adaptive capacity, crisis, hospitals.