Computer Viral Infection at Gwinnett Medical Center Turns Away Patients

Gwinnett County Medical Center is currently not registering patients following a PC-virus that contaminated its systems, published AccessNorthGa.com on December 10, 2011.

In a statement Beth Okun, Spokeswoman for Gwinnett said that on December 7, 2011 some employees came across the virus from when they've been, together with external IT specialists, working towards finding a solution to the problem. Meanwhile, the hospice is perforce conducting its operations on paper. Ajc reported this on December 9, 2011.

Also it's reported that systems have been affected from time-to-time with the infection, which interrupted IT functioning. And while virus incidences aren't uncommon at Gwinnett, the current case is absolutely new for it. The hospital, however, hasn't notified law enforcement yet.

In the meantime, Lt. Eric Eberly Gwinnett County Fire said that the health system had instructed its ambulances for transporting certain patients of trauma starting December 8, 2011 to other hospices in the locality as patient registration as well as other functions had slowed down at the Lawrenceville campus of the medical center owing to the virus. AccessNorthGa.com reported this.

Evidently, on December 9, 2011, patients had to spend unusually more time to get registered, while the computer malware, in addition, disrupted work at the laboratories, radiology and pharmacy departments. Consequently, carrier boys were engaged to conduct various tasks like handing over X-rays to physicians or taking orders to the medical store downstairs.

The hospice, according to Okun is, however, continuing to attend emergency patients, though asking patients of sprained ankle or sore throat type of minor ailments for visiting their routine medical specialists.

Moreover, the Center's total units were getting moved from their original places except for cases of serious respiratory ailments, traumatic arrests or cardiac arrests, Eberly stated, adding that Gwinnett Medical Center would solely accept dire emergencies at its Duluth and Lawrenceville campuses.

Eberly further added that the other hospices were DeKalb Medical Center, Decatur; Emory Eastside Medical Center, Atlanta; Northeast Georgia Medical Center, Gainesville; and Walton Regional Medical Center, Monroe;

Encouragingly, on December 10, 2011, the virus showed no signs of its presence on the Gwinnett computers, Okun reported.

Related article: Computer Virus Writers Adopt New Strategy

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