How 'digital darkness' threatens patient safety (17 February 2026)

Summary

If hospitals lose access to their computers, patient safety can be compromised, Dr. Marcus Schabacker says.

Schabacker is the president and CEO of ECRI, an organisation focused on improving patient safety. The group recently released its annual list of the 10 biggest threats to patient safety, and ECRI placed “digital darkness” events right near the top. Outages of computer systems ranked second, trailing only the misuse of chatbots in medicine.

Hundreds of health systems have endured cyberattacks that have disrupted their systems and forced hospitals to work without key computer systems for a significant amount of time. But Schabacker tells Chief Healthcare Executive that the threats go beyond organisations being hacked.