Inset: Dr Frances O'Hagan, chair of the British Medical Association's (BMA) Northern Ireland general practitioners committee.
In a statement released today (Sunday 21 July), Dr Frances O'Hagan, chair of the British Medical Association's (BMA) Northern Ireland general practitioners committee, has highlighted the severe impact of a recent global IT outage on primary care services.
The outage, which occurred on Friday, affected a crucial online system used by general practitioners (GPs) to access and update patients' clinical records, leading to significant disruptions and a backlog of work.
Dr O'Hagan stated:
"Tomorrow will be a particularly busy day for our GP surgeries as we deal with the aftermath of this outage. A key online system we rely upon to access and update patients' clinical records went down, causing a considerable backlog of work that will now have to be dealt with in this coming week.
“This will of course put considerable strain on general practice, however, staff will continue to provide care to the best of their ability."
The outage forced many GP surgeries to revert to using pen and paper to serve their patients, highlighting the vulnerability of healthcare systems to such technological disruptions. Dr O'Hagan emphasised the need for more investment from the Department of Health in contingency planning and recovery plans to prevent similar incidents in the future.
The widely-used CloudStrike platform provides cloud-based storage and management services to healthcare providers worldwide, as well as global users.
CloudStrike experienced a significant global outage due to a faulty software update. This update was intended to enhance cybersecurity but instead disrupted critical systems worldwide. The outage affected various sectors including healthcare, finance, and transportation, causing widespread chaos and inconvenience.
The BMA has called for a thorough review of the incident to identify lessons that can be learned and to develop strategies to prevent similar disruptions in the future.
In the meantime, GP surgeries are working diligently to address the backlog of work caused by the outage, and patients are urged to be patient while staff do their utmost to provide care.
The incident serves as a reminder of the critical role that technology plays in healthcare delivery and the importance of investing in robust contingency planning to ensure continuity of care in the face of unexpected disruptions.