AJLM2203 - CME/CMLE - Anatomy of a Cyberattack: Part 2, Managing a Clinical Pathology Laboratory During a 25-day Downtime-Anatomy of a Cyberattack: Part 2, Managing a Clinical Pathology Laboratory During a 25-day Downtime

Anatomy of a Cyberattack: Part 2, Managing a Clinical Pathology Laboratory During a 25-day Downtime

Pdf Summary

The document discusses the challenges faced by a clinical pathology laboratory during a 25-day cyberattack-related network outage, affecting patient care operations. The outage led to manual interventions for specimen testing, recruitment of additional staff, and innovative communication modalities to support patient care. The laboratory lacked accurate information on processed samples and test results reported. To address the downtime, manual processes were implemented, such as manual specimen processing, transportation, labeling, and result reporting. The document emphasizes the importance of comprehensive downtime procedures in preparation for such catastrophic events, advising laboratories to address short-term outages and long-term disaster scenarios in their protocols.<br /><br />Major points covered include the impact on the preanalytic, analytic, and postanalytic phases of laboratory testing, the need for manual interventions, staffing adjustments, communication strategies, and overcoming challenges like inadequate requisition forms and loss of automated processes. Strategies employed during the downtime include controlled testing volumes, standardized processes, and ensuring reliable access to office supplies. The document highlights quality control, quality assurance reviews, reset expectations on turnaround times, and the importance of up-to-date requisition forms for patient safety.<br /><br />Lessons learned and recommendations are provided, such as the necessity of having a comprehensive downtime plan, standardizing manual processes, planning for automated processing loss, and ensuring accurate requisition processes. The need for resetting expectations, maintaining QC, conducting QA reviews, and establishing reliable access to supplies and space is also emphasized. The document concludes with references and summaries of critical issues and solutions implemented during the network outage.

Keywords

clinical pathology laboratory

cyberattack-related network outage

patient care operations

manual interventions

innovative communication modalities

downtime procedures

preanalytic, analytic, postanalytic phases

staffing adjustments

quality control, quality assurance reviews

comprehensive downtime plan