Crisis Communication In The Health Sector: A Study Of The Mfantseman Municipal Health Directorate

Abstract

This study explored crisis communication in the health sector with specific emphasis on the Mfantseman Municipal Health Directorate (MMHD). The study highlights the cholera outbreak in the central region, in the year 2025 which eventually degenerated into a crisis and how the MMHD at its level, as the sole regulator of health-related activities in the Mfantseman municipality, handled the crisis. The research identifies specific crisis response strategies, channels and the motivations for their adoption using the situational crisis communication theory (SCCT) and image restoration theory (IRT) to understand the crisis the MMHD faced. This study emphasizes the role communication plays in ensuring there is mutual understanding between an organisation and its publics. Through the qualitative approach, this study relied on the single-case study design which best suited the objective of exploring how the crisis response strategies were communicated by MMHD. Using the purposive sampling approach, this study relied on interviews and document analysis as the means of data collection about the crisis. The findings revealed that MMHD relied on strategies such as deny, specifically scapegoating and bolstering crisis response strategies like ingratiation and reminder to mitigate the crisis. The researcher recommends training spokespersons who can communicate the stance of an organization to their publics in various local dialects to avoid misinformation during a crisis. The study also proposes that organisations or departments in the health sector must learn to incorporate all forms of media channels into managing their reputation and a crisis.