A computer issue that affected a pair of hospitals along Highway 11 is being chalked up to a virus.
Notre-Dame Hospital in Hearst have released a statement from the Health Sciences North that says beginning Wednesday morning 24 hospitals in North-Eastern Ontario were faced with computer issues caused by a ‘zero day virus’, which has no fix yet.
The release goes on to state that the preventative measure of deactivating the computer systems to stop the spread of the virus was done, meaning 21 of 24 hospitals cannot access electronic medical records.
There are 12 hospitals that are currently unable to access the ‘mosaiq’, a cancer program and 10 hospitals are unable to access the medical imaging system and four hospitals have emails and administrative servers inactive.
HSN has stated 75% of their systems are affected by the issue but are working to restore essential systems by tomorrow and the unit intends to offer new chemotherapy and radiotherapy appointments over the weekend to patients whose appointment had been cancelled.
The statement finishes by stating there is no evidence that confidentiality of patient information has been affected, and to stay tuned for further updates regarding the ongoing issues.
