The Southern Health Trust has confirmed that the major IT issues which caused widespread disruption across its services on Wednesday have now been resolved.
In a statement issued on Wednesday night, the Trust said all systems have been restored and will undergo overnight testing before being reconnected in a phased manner from today, Thursday.
While community services are expected to operate as normal, the Trust confirmed that “most planned surgeries and out-patient hospital appointments remain cancelled”.
Staff have been in contact with affected patients and all appointments and operations will be rescheduled “as soon as possible”.
The Trust added: “We are hugely grateful for the support of NIAS, other Trusts and the wider HSC system who have been supporting us throughout [Wednesday]. It will take some time for normal business to be fully restored, and we sincerely apologise once again for the disruption.
“We ask that people avoid coming to our Emergency Departments unless absolutely necessary as we continue to prioritise critical care at this time. The cause of the outage is still being investigated, however there is nothing to indicate any cyber related issues. We would like to thank our staff who continue to do everything possible to keep every patient and service user safe as we work to recover from this outage.”
Earlier on Wednesday the Trust confirmed “significant IT issues” had forced the cancellation of almost all planned surgeries and outpatient appointments, with ambulance diverts put in place and patients urged not to attend hospitals or community services unless absolutely necessary.
