"We are getting extended response times on our samples that they analyze. We have handled it when it has been normal weekdays and we have had decent resources. But we felt now that it was starting to be the weekend that we needed to do a different plan," says Caroline Cherfan, emergency response manager for the region.
There is no forecast for when the IT disruption will be resolved. In practice, it means that patients, for example, will stay longer in emergency departments when analysis of urgent samples needs to be prioritized before others.
What takes an hour (to analyze) can take up to two hours. We're not talking about a few days or longer, but it's still an extension of when everything works.
