NY hospital reverts to pen & paper after online breach: 4 details

Watertown, N.Y.-based Samaritan Medical Center reported its computer system went offline on July 25, according to a local News 7 report.

Four things to know:

1. The health system identified a potential security incident and contacted the FBI and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. Samaritan took its computer system offline when it found the breach.

2. Clinicians had to revert to paper records after the computer system shut down, but continued caring for patients. It also postponed some nonurgent appointments during the outage.

3. Samaritan continued to operate its telephone and fax lines while its computer systems were down.

4. Hospital officials said they didn't think the outage would affect payroll. No patients were transferred during the outage.

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