Social Responsibility of Healthcare Entities in the Conditions of the COVID-19 Pandemic – A Literature Review (Spoleczna odpowiedzialnosc podmiotow leczniczych w warunkach pandemii COVID-19 – przeglad literatury)

Purpose: This article aims to present the concept of corporate social responsibility as applied by healthcare entities in the conditions of the coronavirus pandemic. Design/methodology: The article is a literature review on corporate social responsibility, healthcare, management, and health economics. A critical analysis was performed based on the desk research method, using professional, scientific databases. The article consists of the following parts: introduction; research methodology; issues of corporate social responsibility in the current epidemic conditions, taking into account the areas and tools of CSR as applied by healthcare entities; literature study; limitations; conclusions, and practical implications. Findings: Running medical entities in a socially responsible manner is, in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, perceived as a key and strategic action on the global market, contributing to the competitiveness of a given entity while caring for and shaping its image in the local environment. Research limitations/implications: A critical analysis identified several barriers to the study that could have influenced the overall picture of the considerations. Therefore, this article can be treated as a preliminary diagnosis of the topic under discussion. Subsequently, future analyses should extend to other entities and healthcare institutions to have a complete picture of their implementation of the CSR concept in pandemic conditions. Original value: The approach to the social responsibility of healthcare entities in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic based on the latest scientific studies, taking into account current reports in this regard by Polish and foreign authors, enriching the recent scientific achievements on social responsibility of the health sector and signaling the author’s contribution to the development of the discipline of management and quality sciences.