Posts by Gribbly 12 publicly visible posts • joined 28 Nov 2024
Ok - so cancellation of non critical treatment is step 1 and is the only realistic option as Hospitals cannot function at the same level if you turn off digital systems.
Someone needing a hip replacement goes back on the waiting list so that critical cases can be dealt with
Plans are in place in every Hospital across the country for what you do for almost every conceivable scenario, these are the boards business continuity plans and they take account for capacity drop off.
Each department has incident cards which detail what staff need to do in the event of A,B or C.
Thinking they can just carry on as normal is just wrong.
We can run without computers but it would be a disaster, using digital imaging we are able to have reporters in other locations view and remote on scans within minutes.
There are plans for if everything is down and how we would operate but if you think it would be ever close to what gets done currently in any hospital you are just wrong.
The figure of 50% was quoted to me by a department head when I asked them how it would affect them if the booking system was offline, I don't think their figure is accurate though. It would be a lot worse. 20% is correct though, but you'd need to flip your estimate on it's head, they'd be running at 20% efficency.
>> Is everyone able to type faster than write. How much of the typed input needs to arrive at destination sub second?
LOL , that's NOT how it works. Digital dictation is how most reporting gets done with template insertion, we've a few reporters that rattle through chest x-rays at a rate that needs to be seen to be believed - now if they had to WRITE those..... ouch!
Throw in AI triage for cancer pathways and moving to a paper/pen system would result in a lot of people dying
Ignore is probably the wrong phrasing - but I'm lucky enough that our higher ups in Digital and Security understand that the internet is a single point of failure that is too risky for some systems that need to be available 24/7. So suppliers are free to submit proposals in the cloud, and I'm free to mark these down as unnessesary risk.
Whenever I see the "Bring back the matrons" call it does make me wonder if people realise that hospitals are much much more that just a bunch of wards.
They are a complex series of interconnected organisations trying to exchange information being supported by an army of sparkies, porters, cooks, cleaners, IT staff, admin staff, radiographers, chemists, radiologists and much much more. The complexity of a Hospital estate is mind boggling at times and I don't know how our IT Security officer stays sane to be honest. (or maybe he isn't....)
A cyber attack has very little direct impact on "Matrons" domain. It does however cripple every other part of the hospital and make their work more difficult, but a Matron wouldn't be able to do anything about it.
As one of those "IT people" , we choose to ignore the "cloud first" directive from above. Got several systems being replaced at the moment and current have ruled out any options that require an internet conenction to work. "Cloud where appropriate" is how we view it.
I'd think if the systems are isolated then no , there would be no offsite / remote reporting as the scanners wouldn't be able to send to PACS and the reporting workstations wouldn't have a connection to PACS to view any imaging either - so it's not just scans being done that would be a problem. Anything done the past few weeks wouldn't be available to report.
I'm actually in the middle of re-writting a business continuity plan for Acute Radiology for a hospital board and yes... untenable is one word for it. Requestings coming in from the PMS and getting vetted would be a massive problem as well.
No to mention Radiology reporting would be majorly impacted with reporters having to view imaging on the actual medical imaging modality rather than a viewing workstation with no prior imaging available for comparison. This impacts flow throughout a hospital with Ambulances stacking up outside unable to get patients in and bed log jam at the other end.
Not sure how "Matron" is supposed to fix that.
1) Workflow throughout a hospital is dependant on information from various computerised systems, you unlink those systems and departments are running at 50% speed IF you are lucky.
2) Precautions are in place and plans are made for these situations - this is the mentioned contingency plans.
3) No - it's a cyber attack - you have to isolate systems,
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