Two hospitals in West Virginia are reported to have fallen victim to a ransomware attack launched last week. And as a result of the impact, it’s said that both the healthcare units have stopped accepting patients for emergency service transports.
Ohio Valley Medical Center (OVMC) in Wheeling and East Ohio Regional Hospital (EORH) in Martins Ferry are the two hospitals in the discussion. And as per the sources, both are owned by a parent company named Ohio Valley Health Services & Education Corporation.
The IT staff at both the hospitals have clarified that no patient data was compromised in the incident and assured that the malware attack has been contained and the infected systems have been isolated.
Cybersecurity Insiders has learned that the attack occurred on Friday night making the authorities take the help of paper and pen for admin tasks. As of now, the hospital authorities are only accepting walk-in patients and hopes the resolve the issue by the same time next week.
Karin Janiszewski, the director of Marketing and Public relations confirmed that the hackers succeeded in intercepting the 1st layer of security, but could not get into the 2nd layer which could have caused a disaster as the database was filled with critical info.
Note 1- Ohio Valley Medical Center is a 200-bed hospital facility located in Wheeling, WV. Founded in 1890 the healthcare facility has a reputation of servings its patients with dedicated professionals of physicians, nurses, therapists, and staff members.
Note 2- Founded in 1906 with 30 beds, the East Ohio Regional Hospital has now grown into a 140-bed healthcare facility located in Martins Ferry, Ohio.
