Southern Health Trust Reschedules Key Patient Appointments by October

The Southern Health Trust has announced that most red flag patients whose appointments were postponed due to a recent IT outage will be seen by the end of October. The incident, which prompted a major alert on October 18, 2023, affected multiple sites, including Craigavon Hospital and Daisy Hill Hospital. Patients were advised not to attend appointments or community services during this period.

During a session with Stormont’s Health Committee, Chief Executive Steve Spoerry confirmed that a review of the outage is currently underway. He expressed regret for the inconvenience caused to patients and emphasized the trust’s commitment to rebooking appointments and learning from the incident to prevent future occurrences.

Despite the progress in rescheduling, routine reviews for patients with less urgent needs may not resume until January 21, 2026. Over the two days of the outage, more than 1,600 patients were impacted, including those visiting the Emergency Department. Spoerry noted that the incident disrupted not only patient care but also the operations of health professionals throughout the system.

Health officials, including representatives from the Department of Health, indicated that the electronic system involved was complex and that it would take at least another three weeks to determine the precise cause of the failure. Initial assessments suggest that the outage may have been triggered by a system upgrade.

In response to the situation, Dr. Stephen Austin, the trust’s medical director, assured the public that no patient would be deprioritized on the waiting list for those affected by the IT issue. He highlighted that the trust had identified additional capacity and arranged for extra clinics in the forthcoming weeks. According to Dr. Austin, “We have been able to reschedule 80% of red flag patients, with fewer than five patients still to be rescheduled at this point.”

Officials clarified that the issue did not involve Encompass, Northern Ireland’s new electronic patient record system, but rather a failure in the IT network specific to the Southern Trust. The trust is committed to addressing the challenges posed by this incident and ensuring that patient care remains a top priority moving forward.