On Friday, they also were unable to access their test results through their online patient portal, causing anxiety among those who are waiting to find out developments in serious health conditions.
Kim Medlin of Lebanon had his chemotherapy treatment canceled.
“It is a monthly treatment, and obviously this is going to extend my treatment for an extra month, but it is the break in the treatment that is a concern,” said Medlin, who goes to Kettering Health for monthly infusions as part of a 12-month treatment plan.
“They also were not able to get me rescheduled because of the computer problem,” Medlin said.
Kettering Health’s system-wide technology outage is going into its fourth day with no clear end in sight, though a statement from Kettering Health CEO Mike Gentry on Friday says these types of incidents often range from 10 to 20 days in duration for health care organizations.
“Four days ago, Kettering Health experienced an unscheduled downtime for most of its IT applications. While planned maintenance and updates are routine and occur on an ongoing basis, fortunately an event of this type has been rare for Kettering Health,” Gentry said.
Kettering Health plans to provide daily updates starting this weekend, he said.
“We want to publicly express our appreciation to the network of Greater Dayton and northern Cincinnati hospitals and health systems, particularly Dayton Children’s and Premier Health as they have partnered with us to care for the community during this time,” Gentry said.
Patient appointments where IT applications are a necessary part of care plans are being rescheduled, Gentry said.
Getting care
Medlin said he sees a lot of people getting chemotherapy during his appointments.
“I’m sure that at any given time they’re treating somewhere probably 20, 30 people at a time, and the infusion takes about an hour, so that’s a lot of people that have to reschedule,” he said.
He’s hopeful this won’t impact his health, but he is still concerned about the lapse in his treatment cycle.
“Any interruption in your treatment does have an effect on your health and the outcome,” Medlin said.
Numerous patients are telling the Dayton Daily News that they are still unable to access MyChart, an online patient portal that gives them access to test results, health records and appointments, since the technology outage that started early Tuesday.
“I can’t log in yet,” said Laura Thomas of Moraine.
The office of one of her doctors has an account on Facebook, which is how she found out they are still able to see patients, she said.
Kettering Health said patients should still go to scheduled appointments unless they have already been contacted by phone to reschedule.
“Our offices, while operating on alternate procedures in this situation, are still seeing patients when possible,” Kettering Health said.
Women’s Health patients experiencing urgent needs after-hours can find updated OB-GYN practice phone numbers at ketteringhealth.org/womens-health-after-hours-information.
Patients are worried the health data stored on their MyChart accounts has been accessed by whomever perpetrated the cyberattack.
Kettering Health said there is no evidence that personal cell phone apps, like MyChart, or the information in them have been compromised.
The limited access to MyChart, though, is creating anxiety among patients who rely on the online patient portal for access to important test results.
Bruce Langos of West Carrollton and his wife are awaiting important test results to see if his wife has to continue treatment for a health condition. Due to the technology outage, doctors weren’t able to do all of the testing they needed to do on his wife, and they also can’t find out the results of what they were able to get tested this week, he said.
“You want some stability that these tests didn’t find anything,” Langos said. “You’re looking forward to the results...and then you can’t get those results.”
As ransomware and other cyberattacks increasingly impact health care institutions, the risks to people’s health goes up.
In 2020, a woman in Germany died after a ransomware attack on the University Hospital of Düsseldorf diverted emergency services, causing a delay in treatment.
Also in 2020, a medical malpractice lawsuit against a hospital in Mobile, Alabama alleged the death of a baby born with complications was the result of a ransomware attack against the hospital.
“Health systems are really a growing target because they’re a very attractive target, because they have a lot of money oftentimes and they’re really under pressure to get things back,” said Alex Hamerstone, advisory solutions director for the cybersecurity firm TrustedSec.
Other area hospitals have seen an uptick in the number of patients being diverted to them. Nurses and staff were told early Tuesday to prepare for extra patients, according to one employee at Miami Valley Hospital. There were also some technical difficulties experienced with patients diverted to the hospital.
Mercy Health also said earlier this week that their hospitals saw a bump in their patient volumes.
Kettering Health has 14 area medical centers and more than 120 outpatient locations throughout Western Ohio, as well as Kettering Physician Network, which includes more than 700 board-certified providers.
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