MedStar Health is still trying to return to normal five days after its health information technology systems were hit by a computer virus.
“MedStar's priority continues to be providing high-quality patient care as we move toward full restoration of our IT systems,” according to a statement posted at 5 p.m. Thursday on MedStar's website.
No updates have since been issued. A MedStar spokesperson was unavailable for comment Friday.
“Our doors remain open, with a few exceptions,” according to the Thursday statement. “In those unique exceptions, our protocols for treatment are conservative and driven solely by what is in the best interest of patient care.”
The latest report from the 10-hospital system with facilities in Maryland and Washington, D.C., insisted no patient or “associate” data were compromised.
Last Monday, the system disclosed that the clinical computer systems had been shut down to block the spread of the virus.
An employee, who spoke to the Associated Press on condition of anonymity, said staff was using paper to process patients.
"We can't do anything at all," the employee said then.
Meanwhile, the Baltimore Sun reports, without attribution, that MedStar has received a ransom demand from hackers to pay $18,500 in return for providing the keys to decrypt the healthcare system's data. Thus far, however, MedStar has not confirmed that its system has been victimized by a so-called ransomware attack.
Last month, officials at Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center in Los Angeles decided paying a $17,000 ransom in bitcoins was “the quickest and most efficient way” to restore its computer systems disabled for more than a week by hackers who had encrypted the hospital's data.