Two ambulance trusts which cover most of Southern UK have been affected by a cyber attack on a third-party IT systems supplier.
South Western Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust (SWAST) and South Central Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust (SCAS) both use a system called MobiMed which is owned and operated by Swedish company Ortivus.
Ortivus were the target of a cyber attack on the 18th July which affected a datacentre which the two impacted trusts used for patient data.
A statement by Ortivus said that “The electronic patient records are currently unavailable and are until further notice handled using manual systems. No patients have been directly affected. No other systems have been attacked and no customers outside of those in the hosted datacenter have been affected.
Ortivus are currently working in close collaboration with the affected customers to restore the systems and recover data. The affected customers are the ones using MobiMed ePR, electronic patient record systems in a hosted environment.”
MobiMed ePR
The MobiMed ePR unit is a modular unit capable of recording a patients vital signs – pulse, oxygen levels, ECG data, etc. and conduct decision making actions via its integrated decision making support system by linking to the patient records stored in the Ortivus database.
The system can also access data relating to any current patient treatments as well as real-time messaging and file transfer to online responders and clinicians enabling a wide range of available expertise for patients in life threatening situations.
Impacted area
The ambulance trusts affected cover a large part of Southern UK stretching from Cornwall to Buckinghamshire including major towns and cities including Plymouth, Exeter, Bristol, Bath, Bournemouth, Southampton, Oxford, Reading, and Milton Keynes.
Together, the two trusts serve over 12.5 million residents:
The South Central Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust serves a population of over 7 million residents
The South Western Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust serves a population of over 5.5 million.
As a major tourist area, the South West is also estimated to receive an influx of over 23 million tourists and visitors each year, putting even more lives at risk due to the cyber attack on the ambulance crews main patient care system.