Windsor Regional Hospital looks to lift Code Grey declared over cyberattack
Months after a cyberattack hit five hospitals in southwestern Ontario, Windsor Regional Hospital says it is looking to lift a Code Grey declared in wake of the attack.
Chief Operating Officer Karen Riddell said at a hospital board meeting on Thursday the final two major systems impacted by the attack — one related to dispensing of medication and the other for cardiovascular information — are expected to be coming back online.
If all goes according to plan, the Code Grey will be lifted on Feb. 6.
"We have lots of systems left to bring online," Riddell said. "However, these last two systems ... were part of our last big clinical impact systems impacted."
The Oct. 23, 2023, ransomware attack brought electronic systems offline at five hospitals in Windsor-Essex, Chatham-Kent and Sarnia, which share the IT provider TransForm.
Windsor Regional Hospital says there's still a backlog on diagnostic imagining — MRIs and CT scans — but not for the most urgent of cases. There's a backlog of 10 weeks in cases considered semi-urgent.
Riddell said the hospital is working on a regional recovery plan with other hospitals to address the backlog.
