Global Microsoft Outage Delays Critical Brain Surgery for Terminal Cancer Patient

Chantelle Mooney, a 41-year-old cancer patient, faced a distressing setback when her critical brain surgery was canceled due to a worldwide Microsoft outage on July 19. Mooney, who was scheduled for a craniotomy on that day, learned from her surgeon that the procedure could not proceed due to the global disruption affecting Microsoft systems.

Mooney was diagnosed with stage 4B terminal cervical cancer in February 2022, which had already spread to her lungs. Recently, a new mass was discovered in her brain, measuring 4 centimeters, which required urgent removal after she experienced weakness on one side of her body.

Microsoft systems are crucial for scans

While waiting at the hospital, Mooney saw news of the outage on television. Her surgeon later explained that Microsoft systems, crucial for scans, emergency medication, and accessing medical records, were down, making it impossible to proceed with the surgery.

"I've got a secondary brain tumour - my primary diagnosis is terminal cervical cancer. The brain tumour was only found three weeks ago, it's four centimetres across and has to be removed as an emergency," Mooney said.

Patient was initially hopeful that the issue would be resolved 

The outage led to a morning of uncertainty for Mooney, who was initially hopeful that the issue would be resolved. By 1:30 p.m., the hospital confirmed that the surgery would be postponed until the following Friday. Mooney added, “Ten minutes later, the surgeon came in and said they can't do the surgery without Microsoft systems. A lot of the tools and scans use Microsoft, and they use it for emergency medication.”

The decision to cancel the surgery was made with patient safety as the top priority. "It's a long surgery, ranging from four to seven hours, and by 1:30 p.m., they confirmed there was no way they were going to proceed. If the systems went down again, it would be too risky," Mooney explained.

Her surgeon underscored the potential dangers of proceeding without the technology: "They wouldn't have been able to perform brain scans, administer blood transfusions - they couldn't even access my medical records. They really didn't want to cancel the surgery given its urgency, but ultimately, my safety comes first."

The global IT outage was the result of a CrowdStrike update 

The global IT outage was traced back to a recent update from CrowdStrike, a cybersecurity firm. This disruption affected various sectors, including healthcare, causing significant delays and operational challenges worldwide.

Microsoft acknowledged the issue and worked to resolve it. "Earlier today, a CrowdStrike update was responsible for bringing down a number of IT systems globally," Microsoft said in a statement. By late Friday, Microsoft reported that mitigation actions had been completed and services had recovered, though monitoring would continue to ensure ongoing stability.