When systems go down in healthcare, the consequences ripple far beyond IT departments. The recent CrowdStrike-related outage that happened in 2024 had long-lasting effects in Rhode Island’s RIBridges system. This is a prime example of how critical it is to have robust downtime and recovery strategies in place.
A Quick Recap of the RIBridges Incident
According to TechTarget, on May 11, 2024, the Rhode Island Department of Human Services’ RIBridges system, responsible for managing Medicaid, SNAP, and other vital services, was rendered unavailable for over five hours due to a misconfigured endpoint detection and response (EDR) update pushed by CrowdStrike. The error resulted in RIBridges falsely detecting a cyberattack and essentially locking itself down. While the system was not hacked, the response to the false alert functioned like a real breach, blocking access to patient benefits and delaying service.
While RIBridges isn’t a hospital system, the implications are just as critical. The system outage prevented users from accessing Medicaid eligibility and other vital health benefits. In an inpatient setting, similar downtime could mean delayed treatments, inaccessible medical records, and lost revenue, or worse, compromised patient care.
The Bigger Problem: Unplanned Downtime and IT Overconfidence
The Rhode Island report shows a broader issue many healthcare organizations face: overreliance on vendor systems without sufficient redundancy or validated recovery procedures. The state’s forensic investigation revealed several red flags:
- Lack of robust internal testing before deploying updates
- No backup system for critical eligibility checks
- Insufficient communication workflows during the outage
This kind of disruption is not unique. In fact, unplanned downtime costs healthcare organizations an average of $8,662 per minute, according to Ponemon Institute research. And yet, many hospitals continue to rely on outdated manual downtime procedures, if they have any documented process at all.
Downtime Isn’t a “What If” It’s a “When”
Whether it’s a system misconfiguration, a ransomware attack, or a natural disaster, hospitals must prepare for inevitable disruptions. The real question is: Will you be ready to continue patient care when it happens?
Downtime readiness isn’t just about backups or cybersecurity. It’s about:
- Ensuring clinical continuity when EHRs and systems are unavailable
- Providing staff with automated tools to access essential records
- Minimizing financial loss and regulatory risk
- Reducing patient safety risks caused by unavailable or delayed data
How dbtech Helps Hospitals Prepare
dbtech’s Downtime Solution provides a seamless, secure bridge for hospitals during IT outages. With our platform, hospitals can:
- Enable full patient intake during downtime, including registration, armband printing, and entry of clinical data such as vitals and medication orders
- Empower clinical staff with real-time access to EHR information, even when the main system is down
- Ensure compliance with HIPAA and disaster recovery regulations
- Eliminate risky, manual workarounds like printing paper reports or relying on outdated spreadsheetsIntegrate with EHR’s like EPIC, Cerner Downtime, 724 Downtime and MEDITECH Downtime
You can’t afford to hope your systems stay up. Prepare for when they don’t.
Prevent Downtime at Your Organization
The Rhode Island incident wasn’t caused by hackers, but the impact was just as disruptive. For hospitals and health systems, this is a powerful reminder: downtime is not just a technical problem, it’s a patient care problem. Now is the time to evaluate your downtime strategy, before the next CrowdStrike-type incident happens in your environment. Talk to our team at dbtech to learn more about how you can get a downtime solution for just $299 per workstation.