‘Total IT failure’ at four hospitals sparks safety concerns

Four hospitals in Greater Manchester are struggling with a near ‘total IT failure’ which has forced staff in all key services to use handwritten lists and notes.

The problems have affected multiple IT systems across Royal Oldham, Fairfield General, Rochdale Infirmary and North Manchester General hospitals.

Staff at the sites are running theatre and emergency departments using handwritten patient lists and notes, while bloods and scan results are also being written by hand. Patient histories are largely unavailable.

HSJ spoke to staff who said there are major concerns over patient safety, as the lack of digital systems increases the risk of errors, and also slows down multiple processes. They described the problems as a “total IT failure”.

Chris Brookes, deputy CEO and chief medical officer, said: “Patient safety and maintaining essential services remains our priority. We are doing everything we can to fix the IT issues and to limit disruption to patients and our services."

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Source: HSJ, 25 May 2022