Outage that paralyzed GP EPR system resolved

Repeated outages that caused “significant disruption” to GP surgeries across the country have been resolved on Friday, according to a spokesman for EMIS, which provides a range of services including prescription management, patient records and appointment booking.

,EMI The web is available to all practices today,” the spokesperson said in a statement. “We are very sorry for the significant disruption caused by the technical issues experienced on Friday 26 May. The cause of the problem was identified and resolved on the same day.”

The company did not give further details of the cause of the problems, which left many GPs unable to schedule or easily view patients’ records. Payment & reported on Tuesday that “thousands” of drills had been affected. EMIS’s electronic patient record system is used by most NHS GPs in the UK.

“We have been in contact with our customers to share what happened and the immediate changes we are implementing to make sure it never happens again,” the EMIS statement concluded.

In March, a preliminary investigation by the UK Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) found that UnitedHealth’s £1.2bn proposed deal to buy EMIS could reduce competition, hurting the NHS and ultimately the consequences for patients and UK taxpayers can get bad.