How the Microsoft outage is impacting our local hospitals

Update (July 19 - 3:45pm):

According to the University of Maryland Medical System, progress has been made in getting their IT systems back up to normal, but it could take a few more days.

"At this time, all UMMS member organizations have started to transition away from downtime procedures to normal operation as we recover from this incident," a spokesperson tells WMAR-2 News. "We anticipate that full recovery will take a few days, but we remain open to care for patient needs at this time."

Update (July 19 - 2:55pm):

According to LifeBridgeHealth, Sinai Hospital resumed non-urgent and elective surgeries and procedures Friday afternoon after the Microsoft outage forced some earlier in the day to be canceled.

"Information Services teams are bringing computers back online with prioritization to systems related to patient care, with guidance from our hospital command centers. Many departments are fully back online," LifeBridge said in an updated statement to WMAR-2 News. "To ensure that patient care is not affected, LifeBridge Health facilities have protocols and back-up systems in place for these types of situations, and some of these downtime procedures have been implemented, where needed."

Original Story:

Hospitals and doctors offices throughout Maryland are experiencing technical difficulties due to the worldwide Microsoft outage that occurred overnight Friday.

A spokesperson for LifeBridge Health says a command center was set up to deal with computer system issues.

Currently, Sinai, Northwest and Carroll Hospitals are impacted.

As result Sinai is rescheduling non-urgent procedures and surgeries. Efforts are also underway to assist their physician practices.

As for the University of Maryland Medical System, a spokesperson told WMAR-2 News that each of their locations have "implemented downtime procedures to ensure orderly operations and patient safety."

UMMS describes downtime procedures as "commonly used alternative processes for recordkeeping and operations that allow [them] to safely care for patients during any kind of IT disruption."

Meanwhile, MedStar says all their hospitals are operating as normal.

Johns Hopkins Medicine facilities are "experiencing minimal impact" to their IT functions, but remain open, according to a spokesperson.

"JHM has emergency preparedness protocols, including downtime procedures, in place that ensure the health system is able to maintain continuity in our operations and ability to continue to provide safe, high quality care in the event of an outage, like this," the rep for Hopkins Medicine explained.

According to Governor Wes Moore, 911 and first responder systems are functioning.

"Our 9-1-1 networks and first responder systems have remained resilient, and we continue to monitor all systems to ensure they are running at full capacity," Moore said in a statement. "After conducting a full review of all state systems, I am confident we know the issues that need our attention, and we will work continually until all systems are back to normal operations.”