Microsoft outage: Northern Ireland NHS hit by Crowdstrike software bug as Microsoft Windows users worldwide see systems crash
Northern Ireland’s NHS is among the entities facing problems thanks to a worldwide IT calamity which has caused computers everywhere to crash.
The Department of Health said that the problem was having “a number of impacts”.
This includes problems booking patients into operating theatres, accessing staff rosters, capturing digital endoscopy images, and operating radiotherapy services.
Around two-thirds of GP practices across Northern Ireland use an IT system that has been affected.
This means that these practices are unable to access their clinical system to view and update patient records, and cannot generate routine patient prescriptions and test requests or see results of laboratory tests.
Practices which have been affected are being asked to revert to “established paper-based processes where necessary” and are operating on an emergency appointment basis only.
Airline Ryanair said it had been forced to cancel a small number of flights and there has been disruption to vehicle testing services in the Republic of Ireland.
The outage has hit industries across the world, leading to cancelled flights and problems in some healthcare, retail and banking settings.
Cybersecurity firm Crowdstrike said a defect in one of its software updates affected Microsoft Windows PCs.
A spokesperson for the Department of Health in Northern Ireland said there were a number of impacts to healthcare.
The spokesperson added: “The impacts are continuing to be collated, assessed and responded to urgently, patient care remains the priority and all HSC organisations continue to deliver services to patients as best as possible while the IT issues are fixed.
“The impacts currently include hospital services – for example booking patients into operating theatres, accessing staff rosters, capturing digital endoscopy images and operating radiotherapy “services as well as some primary care services”.
“Around two thirds of GP practices across Northern Ireland use an IT system that has been affected.
“This means that these practices are unable to access their clinical system to view and update patient records, and cannot generate routine patient prescriptions and test requests or see results of laboratory tests.
“The affected practices will be operating on an emergency appointment basis only until the IT issues are resolved.”
The spokesperson added that teams are being asked to temporarily invoke plans for such disruption and that technology teams are working intensively to rectify the issue.
Any patients requiring an urgent supply of their regular prescription medicines who are unable to get a prescription from their GP, are being asked to contact their local community pharmacist to obtain the medication.
Gerard Greene, chief executive of Community Pharmacy NI reassured patients that pharmacies are dispensing medicines as normal.
Belfast International Airport said passengers were being processed as normal but that as part of a global network that is experiencing disruption, delays and cancellations can be expected.