Kettering Health Confirms Cyberattack, ERs Remain Open

Kettering Health Confirms Cyberattack, ERs Remain Open

The outage, which began earlier this week, could persist for 10 to 20 days, according to hospital officials.

Kettering Health has confirmed that the ongoing systemwide technology outage affecting its hospitals and outpatient centers was caused by a ransomware attack. The outage, which began earlier this week, could persist for 10 to 20 days, according to hospital officials.

Despite the disruption, Kettering Health announced on Saturday that all emergency departments, urgent care, and on-demand care locations remain open and continue to treat patients.

For patients with urgent health issues, Kettering Health has activated support helplines. Patients with after-hours, weekend, or holiday concerns can call MatchMD at 1-866-257-5363. For questions during regular business hours, Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., patients can call (937) 600-6879.

To ensure these phone lines remain available for those with immediate medical needs, the hospital system has requested that individuals avoid using them for inquiries related to the outage, data security, or scheduling of non-urgent appointments.

Speaking for the first time since the cyberattack, Kettering Health administrators addressed public concerns on Friday night, acknowledging the scale and seriousness of the incident. They confirmed that no ransom was paid and that there had been no direct communication with the attacker.

John Weimer, senior vice president and leader for Incident Command at Kettering Health, said, “Organizations that have experienced this type of unauthorized access are typically down for 10 to 20 days. We are working to be on the lower end of that scale.”

Kettering Health operates 14 medical centers and over 120 outpatient facilities across Western Ohio. Its physician network includes more than 700 board-certified providers, many of whom continue to face service disruptions due to the outage, including limited access to patient information systems like MyChart.

Stay tuned for more such updates on Digital Health News

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