IT System Outages in Local Public Healthcare Institutions and Measures to Ensure Resiliency under Healthier SG
Ministry of HealthSpeakers
Summary
This question concerns Dr Lim Wee Kiak’s inquiry into the number of healthcare IT outages and measures ensuring system capacity and resilience for Healthier SG. Senior Minister of State Dr Janil Puthucheary stated that the government is reviewing system architecture and investing in capabilities to minimize disruption impacts. He noted that institutions use business continuity plans to maintain care services, such as viewing historical data when applications are unavailable. These plans ensure doctors can continue patient care, though they may be unable to input new information during outages. Patients are advised to contact their healthcare providers directly for medical assistance if a system malfunction occurs.
Transcript
11 Dr Lim Wee Kiak asked the Minister for Health (a) in the past three years, how many incidences of IT system outage have occurred at local public healthcare institutions; (b) what measures are being taken to ensure that the national healthcare IT system will have adequate capacity for the planned system enhancements under Healthier SG; and (c) what helplines or support will be available to affected persons in case of an IT system outage or malfunction, especially for doctors and patients.
The Senior Minister of State for Health (Dr Janil Puthucheary) (for the Minister for Health): Mr Speaker, Sir, as explained in Parliament on 12 September and 20 October this year, we will continue to review our system design and architecture, and invest in capabilities to strengthen the resilience of our IT systems and reduce disruptions. We are also reviewing our downtime and business processes to minimise the impact during outages.
Our public healthcare institutions have business continuity plans that are activated in case of emergencies. Each institution's business continuity plan is supported by solutions with appropriate functionality and can be used when key applications are unavailable to allow public healthcare institutions to continue with the delivery of patient care services. For example, users would be able to view a patient's historical clinical information but may not be able to enter new clinical information into the system during the downtime. Patients should contact their healthcare provider for medical assistance as needed.