University Hospital Limerick announce widespread service cancellations due to cyberattack

In a statement issued this afternoon, the hospital said that the cancellations are a result of the ongoing disruption from the HSE cyber-attack. Picture: Dan Linehan

Widespread cancellations have been announced across all six sites of the UL hospital group due to the ongoing disruption by the ransomware attack on HSE IT systems.

All outpatient clinics have been cancelled, including all paediatric outpatient appointments.

Those who have been affected have been asked not to attend previously scheduled appointments unless they have been contacted.

Routine cancer review appointments at the MidWestern Cancer Centre have been cancelled from Thursday, May 20 until further notice.

Urgent review appointments will still go ahead.

Dr Denis O'Keeffe, consultant haematologist at UHL, said: “We would like to reassure patients whose review appointments are deferred that their appointments will be reassigned as soon as it is possible to do so and services return to normal. "

If anyone is scheduled for an urgent review appointment for haematology or oncology, they are asked to contact 061 482900 for further information.

All elective inpatient and day-case procedures have also been cancelled across the UL hospital group, with the exception of time-critical cases that will be contacted directly.

Diagnostic appointments such as x-ray, CT scans, MRI appointments, cardiac investigations and endoscopy services have also been cancelled.

These cancellations affect all patients due to attend the following hospitals:

• University Hospital Limerick
• University Maternity Hospital Limerick
• Ennis Hospital
• Nenagh Hospital
• St John’s Hospital
• Croom Orthopaedic Hospital 

 The UL group has confirmed that a limited number of services will be going ahead as planned including maternity services, dialysis treatment, the acute fracture unit at UHL and vaccination centres at the Radisson Blu Hotel (Limerick), West County Hotel (Ennis) and Abbey Court Hotel (Nenagh).

Cancer services on the day ward, including chemotherapy and radiotherapy, will continue to operate and all patients with appointments for Wednesday, May 19 are advised to attend.

Dr O'Keeffe added: "We would like to stress that those patients who are on treatment, including chemotherapy and radiotherapy, and other ongoing treatments for their cancers can contact us..."

The Emergency Department will continue to operate 24-hours a day, but people are asked to consider all care options before attending, and only to do so in an emergency.

Injury Units are operating in Ennis Hospital and Nenagh Hospital and are open from 8am to 8pm and St John’s Hospital from 8am to 7pm.

The Maternity Emergency Unit is available 24-7 and the Early Pregnancy Assessment Unit continues to operate an appointment only service.

Patients are advised to check for updates on the HSE Service Disruption Website as services are likely to be disrupted into early next week.