Table 1.

Summary of health system resilience definitions

Author	Resilience definition	Resilience process	Resilience outcome
Ammar et al. (2016)	The capacity of a health system to absorb internal or external shocks (e.g. prevent or contain disease outbreaks and maintain functional health institutions) while sustaining achievements.	Absorb	Sustain achievements Sustain or improve access Maintain function Long-term sustainability
	Resilience is the ability of a health system to sustain or improve access to healthcare services while ensuring long-term sustainability.
Therrien et al. (2017)	The capacity/intrinsic ability of a social system (e.g. an organization, city or society) to proactively adapt to and recover from disturbances that are perceived within the system to fall outside the range of normal and expected disturbances/conditions so that it can sustain required operations.	Adapt Recover	Sustain required operations Recover from
Hanefeld et al. (2018)	HSR is about the system being able to adapt its functioning to absorb a shock and transform if necessary, to recover from disasters.	Absorb Adapt Transform	Recover from
Bayntun et al. (2012)	The capability of the public health and healthcare systems, communities and individuals to prevent, protect against, quickly respond to and recover from health emergencies, particularly those whose scale, timing or unpredictability threatens to overwhelm routine capabilities.	Prevent Protect against Respond to	Recover from
McKenzie et al. (2016)	Resilience is the capacity of health systems to deal with change, to adapt and transform and to maintain relevance when confronted by major disruptions	Adapt Transform	Maintain relevance
Blanchet et al. (2017)	The capacity of a [health system] to absorb, adapt [OR] transform when exposed to a shock such … armed conflict and still retain the same control over its structure and functions.	Absorb Adapt Transform	Control over structure and functions
Ager et al. (2015)	The ability… to manage change, by maintaining or transforming…standards in the face of shocks or stresses … without compromising … long-term prospects	Manage	Maintain standards Transform standards Long-term sustainability
Kruk et al. (2017)	The capacity of health actors, institutions and populations to prepare for and effectively respond to crises, maintain core functions when crisis hits and informed by lessons learnt during the crisis, re-organize if conditions require it.	Prepare for Respond to Learn Re-organize	Maintain function
Barasa et al. (2018)	A system’s ability to continue to meet its objectives in the face of challenges		Meet objectives