Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust disclosed a significant data loss affecting its maternity records following a mistake in its information technology department. The incident occurred on August 18 when routine technical work intended to create a backup of the radiotherapy database inadvertently targeted the maternity records database instead, resulting in the maternity database being overwritten.
The error stemmed from the use of pre-written computer instructions originally designed for a different hospital system. A configuration setting that should have been modified before executing the process was overlooked, causing the technical procedure to run against the wrong database. The affected maternity database contained records spanning from September 2011 to November 2022, representing more than a decade of patient information.
Hospital officials stated that they responded quickly upon discovering the problem and engaged external specialists in recovery efforts. While they successfully restored patient care data including clinical notes, observations, and test results, they were unable to fully reconstruct the complete access history documenting which personnel viewed maternity records during the affected period. Consequently, the hospital indicated it may be unable to confirm in most cases whether specific individuals accessed particular maternity records within that timeframe.
Andy Callow, the hospital’s chief digital and information officer, issued an apology and indicated that the organization has initiated measures to strengthen technical controls and processes. He emphasized that the current data loss does not affect ongoing patient care delivery. The hospital also confirmed that no patient information was accessed or used inappropriately as a result of the incident.
The data loss disclosure arrives during an ongoing police investigation examining allegations that over 500 mothers and babies experienced potentially avoidable harm or death due to systemic issues within the hospital’s maternity department. Authorities are examining whether the recent data loss has implications for the larger investigation and whether criminal charges may be warranted.
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