• Catriona Duffy, Caroline Murray, Gerard Boran, Rama Srinivasan, Anne Kane, and Ann Leonard.
• Laboratory Medicine Innovation Hub, Department of Laboratory Medicine, Tallaght University Hospital, Dublin 24, Ireland. catriona.duffy@tuh.ie.
• Ir J Med Sci. 2024 Apr 1; 193 (2): 889896889-896.

BackgroundOn Friday 14 May 2021, the Health Service Executive (HSE) was subjected to a serious cyberattack on their information technology (IT) infrastructure. Healthcare workers lost access to HSE-provided clinical and non-clinical IT systems, including laboratory systems.AimThe aim of this national survey was to capture Laboratory Medicine's response across the Republic of Ireland during the HSE cyberattack.MethodAn electronic survey developed using Microsoft Forms® was emailed on 24 September 2021 to 58 local representatives of the PeriAnalytic and Laboratory Medicine Society (PALMSoc).ResultsThe survey was sent to 43 clinical laboratories across the Republic of Ireland. A total of 41 responses from 43 laboratories across all laboratory disciplines were received (95% response rate). From these, 55% did not have access to a functioning LIS, with 56% of these not having access to a LIS for greater than 2 weeks. A decrease in specimen requests received during this period was reported by 74% of laboratories, with 32% experiencing a reduction that lasted in excess of one month. Over half of the laboratories (55%) experienced a reduction of > 30% in requests, indicating that clinicians stopped investigating patients (87% reduction in primary care), further escalating the disruption to healthcare.ConclusionThe cyberattack burdened the HSE and laboratories at a time when healthcare staffs were coming to terms with the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. Despite this, the survey confirms the agility of laboratory staff in meeting the demands placed on it during this time.© 2023. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Royal Academy of Medicine in Ireland.

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