London Hospitals Hit by Critical Incident Impacting Transfusions

(Bloomberg) -- Services at several London hospitals were disrupted after a critical IT incident at a provider that helps manage blood transfusions and lab services. 

A clinical alert went out to all staff at Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust on Monday afternoon saying that it had lost access to the IT system and said that only urgent blood components would be issued, according to a memo seen by Bloomberg. 

The hospital trust’s Chief Executive Officer Ian Abbs told employees that evening that the IT systems at provider Synnovis had experienced a major, ongoing incident that was impacting services, according to an email seen by Bloomberg.

Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust is made up of five hospitals, including the Royal Brompton which is the largest specialist heart and lung center in the UK. Synnovis also works with King’s College Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, which is one of London’s largest teaching hospitals.

Representatives for Guy’s and St Thomas’ didn’t have an immediate comment. A representative for Synnovis confirmed a major service disruption, but had no additional comment immediately. 

Synnovis is a partnership between the company Synlab UK & Ireland, Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust, and King’s College Hospital NHS Foundation Trust. 

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Synlab AG had announced a cyberattack impacting its IT systems in Italy in April, though the company said at the time that the hack had no impact on operations in other countries. A representative for Synlab AG confirmed a cyber incident had occurred, but didn’t have additional comment.