Public hospitals, healthcare institutions across Singapore hit by system disruptions
NHG Health institutions, the National University Hospital and Singapore General Hospital are experiencing system disruptions.
A view of Tan Tock Seng Hospital.
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SINGAPORE: Healthcare institutions across Singapore reported system disruptions on Tuesday (Oct 13), affecting services ranging from appointment bookings to patient registration and call centre operations.
NHG Health, the National University Hospital and Singapore General Hospital (SGH) separately reported disruptions that could result in longer waiting times and delays for patients.
The affected institutions belong to Singapore’s three public healthcare clusters – NHG Health, the National University Health System (NUHS) and SingHealth.
NHG Health said in a Facebook post on Tuesday morning that the call centre lines for its institutions were temporarily unavailable.
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It subsequently updated the post to say that its institutions were experiencing a system disruption affecting some services.
The group said it was working to restore the affected services, and has deployed additional staff to assist with patient services on site.
NHG Health oversees four hospitals – Tan Tock Seng Hospital, Khoo Teck Puat Hospital, Woodlands Hospital and Yishun Community Hospital.
It also manages 10 polyclinics and institutions including the Institute of Mental Health, National Skin Centre and National Centre for Infectious Diseases.
Tan Tock Seng Hospital said patients visiting its clinics and pharmacy could experience longer waiting times because of the disruption.
NHG Health advised patients and members of the public to visit its websites or use the HealthHub and NHG Health apps for assistance.
“We are sorry for the inconvenience caused. We seek your understanding and patience during this time,” the group said.
CNA’s calls to NHG’s main contact centre hotline at 10am immediately failed before connecting.
Calls to Tan Tock Seng Hospital and Khoo Teck Puat Hospital also failed to connect, although a call to the Institute of Mental Health connected successfully.
NUHS, SGH TECHNICAL DISRUPTIONS
Separately, NUHS said in a Facebook post that it was “experiencing technical disruptions affecting multiple systems”.
“We seek the public’s understanding that longer waiting times may be expected,” said NUHS, adding that it is working with Synapxe, Singapore’s national HealthTech agency, to resolve the matter.
NUHS comprises eight polyclinics, three speciality centres and five hospitals including National University Hospital, Alexandra Hospital and Ng Teng Fong General Hospital.
SGH, under the SingHealth cluster, also reported a temporary system disruption affecting several services, including outpatient appointment bookings and changes, visitor registration and billing enquiries.
The hospital said its call centre remained open but was temporarily unable to process appointment bookings or changes.
Visitor registration could also take longer than usual, and patients were advised to allow additional time when visiting.
“Our teams are working to restore the affected systems as soon as possible and will provide updates when services resume,” SGH said.
“We sincerely apologise for the inconvenience and thank you for your patience and understanding.”
Meanwhile, Singapore’s 24-hour national mental health helpline and textline service, mindline.sg, also experienced technical difficulties earlier on Tuesday.
In an update at 12pm, it said its services are now fully operational.
The cause of the disruptions and whether the incidents were connected remained unclear. CNA has contacted Synapxe and the healthcare clusters for more information.
Source: CNA/co(kg)
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