Systemwide outage affecting HSHS, Prevea hospitals, clinics

HSHS St. Clare Memorial Hospital in Oconto Falls is among the six Wisconsin hospitals affected by a systemwide outage that is affecting all clinical and administrative applications and most phones and internet in the state and Illinois.

The outage also has hit Prevea Health, which partners with HSHS hospitals in Wisconsin. MyChart/MyPrevea communication is also down.

“Hospital Sisters Health System (HSHS) and Prevea Health became aware of a system outage that has temporarily taken offline virtually all operating systems,” according to a website set up by the hospital system to address the issue.

HSHS was first made aware of the outage Sunday.

“We are continuing to follow existing protocols for system outages, including taking steps to minimize disruptions and ensure high quality, safe patient care,” according to the website.

The main line for each HSHS Wisconsin hospital is now working. Anyone trying to reach an inpatient at HSHS St. Clare Memorial Hospital and who does not have a personal cellphone can call 920-846-3444.

In addition, the Prevea Health main phone line at 920-496-4700 continues to work as well; however, those calling may experience delays or connectivity issues.

Patients who have appointments should still show up as scheduled.

“We acknowledge this outage is causing inconvenience for some patients and that services may take longer to schedule or receive,” according to the website. “We are grateful to our caregivers, colleagues and physicians, who are doing everything possible to ensure we can continue to serve our community while we work diligently to resolve the outages.”

“We are well trained to take care of our patients’ needs until the issue is resolved.”

HSHS said at it mobilized its incident command protocols and downtime procedures and engaged “outside experts” to determine what happened.

“We are continuing to follow existing protocols for system outages, including taking steps to minimize disruptions and ensure high quality, safe patient care,” the website said.

Officials have not described the issue as a cybersecurity attack. It was unclear if any patient or employee data or confidential company data was compromised in any potential breach.

“We are continuing to look into this issue,” the site said.

According to hospital officials, nearly all HSHS hospital and clinic locations remain open, although specifics were not provided.

When the matter will be resolved remains unknown.

The website for hospital system updates is www.hshsupdates.org.

kpasson@newmedia-wi.com