Journal of Urgent Care Medicine

Hospitals Cancel Procedures During CrowdStrike Crash

Last week’s CrowdStrike software crash left some health systems in emergency downtime situations, while others ended up delaying patients’ medical procedures, according to Healthcare Dive. The crash has been characterized in Becker’s as “worse than a cyberattack.” The American Hospital Association also said: “These disruptions are resulting in some clinical procedure delays, diversions, or cancellations. Impact is also being felt indirectly as a result of local emergency call centers being down.” Some scheduling, check-in, and …

Providers Remain Empty-Handed While Change Recovers From Cyberattack

On March 10, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) issued a letter to the entire healthcare industry regarding the massive cyberattack on UnitedHealth Group’s (UHG) Change Healthcare unit, which started on February 21. Change processes 15 billion healthcare transactions annually and has a connection to 1 in every 3 patient records, according to HHS. Its system is a clearing house for a number of critical services, such as revenue cycle, pharmacy, and clinical …

Education is Key to Avoiding Increasingly Sophisticated Cyber Crime

Urgent message: As digital communication becomes more integral to our daily lives and job functions, cybercriminals are increasingly employing nefarious social engineering tactics like “phishing” to steal our valuable personal, professional, and financial information. Urgent care employees at every level should be trained to recognize phishing scams, and how to effectively safeguard themselves and their organizations from attack. Alan A. Ayers, MBA, MAcc is Chief Executive Officer of Velocity Urgent Care and is Practice Management …

Report is a Wakeup Call to Beef Up Data Security

About a quarter of all healthcare consumers have been the victims of healthcare data breaches, according to a new study by Accenture—and nearly have of those people ended up victims of medical identity theft. The cost? On average, $2,500 in out-of-pocket costs per incident, paid by the victim. Breaches were most likely to occur in hospitals, though urgent care centers, pharmacies, physician offices, and health insurers were also fertile ground for hackers and identity thieves. …