#GeordieHospital: more than a TV show and tweets to reflect on the complexities of public health communication today

I have in recent weeks been preparing for a study about Channel4's television series Geordie Hospital, which was on air last year and triggered a wave of activity on Twitter with the #GeordieHospital hashtag (#GH).

#GH was filmed in NHS hospitals in the UK and widely tweeted as the country was recovering a modicum of normality after the Covid-19 lockdowns.

This illustrates the importance that communication has for healthcare providers and arguably for everyone who is a stakeholder in public health outcomes today.

Channel 4's TV series was filmed in hospitals in Newcastle upon Tyne

GH is valuable to explore processes of biomedicalization, described by Briggs and Hallin as 'the greater interpenetration of biomedicine into other social structures, such as industry, the state, and the mass media'.

Why study a medical show and its tweets?

Big concepts such as biomedicalization don't readily convey the importance of researching medical television shows and what people tweet about them.

Given the value that people attribute to health and healthcare in today's world, however, they help to map the complexity of the various groups, institutions, and individuals who shape the way societies communicate about health today.

When combined with concepts such as William's "Structures of feeling", the ideas summoned help to close in on dynamics that could seem superficial, but that gain in significance as one looks closer. A closer look is indeed needed, considering how much more complex the communication environment is today.

The study of health communication was successful in adopting theoretical developments such as the Health Belief Model and Diffusion of Innovations. Such knowledge empowered governments and health agencies to enact interventions from water boiling to cancer screening, to cite but a few, that have helped communities to heal and or thrive.

But technological change and communication practices area changing and distrust, disinformation, or mere lack of attention in today's crowded airwaves and digital spaces, call for continued attention.

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