Community Health Systems Experience IT Outages Due to Oracle Health Data Deletion

Community Health Systems recently faced IT outages across multiple hospitals following the deletion of data accessed through its Oracle Health electronic health records system.

Details of the Outage

The outage, lasting five days, was resolved on Monday evening after causing disruptions at various CHS hospitals. The incident, although not widely reported, impacted operations at 72 hospitals in 14 states where CHS operates.

According to reports, the outage was triggered by Oracle Health engineers who inadvertently deleted patient information during routine maintenance at a data center. The affected hospital, CHS Grandview Medical Center in Birmingham, Alabama, confirmed the accidental outage, assuring that the issue would be resolved promptly.

Concerns and Responses

John Riggi, the American Hospital Association’s national advisor for cybersecurity and risk, expressed concerns regarding the disruption caused by the loss of access to patient records, emphasizing the critical nature of maintaining data integrity for patient care.

Oracle Health has faced previous challenges, including malicious compromises of legacy Cerner Corporation and Oracle cloud systems. Recent reports also suggest breaches involving legacy Cerner data migration servers and alleged compromises of Oracle Cloud federated SSO login servers, affecting numerous corporate and government domains.

Previous Security Incidents

Two years ago, CHS encountered a malicious data breach through its GoAnywhere managed file transfer software, exposing vulnerabilities that were exploited by attackers in a global hacking scheme. Despite being among the first healthcare organizations to report a breach during the attack, CHS has since enhanced its security measures to prevent similar incidents.

Response from Stakeholders

Healthcare IT News has reached out to both CHS and Oracle Health for official statements regarding the recent outage and security concerns. Updates on their responses will be provided as the story unfolds.

Andrea Fox is senior editor of Healthcare IT News.

Email: afox@himss.org

Healthcare IT News is a HIMSS Media publication.