Denial, as a speech act, is defined as the addresser’s “unwillingness to see or admit a truth that ought to be apparent and is, in fact, apparent to many others” (Tedlow 2010, 36). Prior studies of denial have mainly focused on its strategies and functions (e.g., Boogaart et al. 2021; Davis 2011). These studies have revealed that addressers can employ straightforward denial or shift blame (Benoit 2015) to reject responsibility for a trust violation, potentially contributing to trust repair (Ferrin et al. 2007). However, while prior studies have suggested that denial strategies can be used to repair trust (e.g., Ho 2019), denial is not always an effective means of doing so. For example, on November 7, 2023, an online post emerged claiming that several students from a hospital’s breast surgery team had been diagnosed with cancer, causing public concern. In response, the hospital issued an official statement denying the claim in the online post. However, rather than dispelling doubts, the statement triggered further scepticism online. This reaction likely reflects doubts about the hospital’s accountability, suggesting that denial strategies may diminish trust rather than repair it (Kim et al. 2004; McCready 2015). Such incidents raise important questions about the conditions under which denial strategies can effectively repair/rebuild trust. This study, therefore, explores the types and effectiveness of denial strategies in rebuilding trust with evidence from the hospital’s statement. Specifically, we conducted a discourse analysis of the denial strategies in the hospital’s statement and evaluated their effectiveness in rebuilding public trust through experiments.