A Los Angeles hospital has been forced to pay nearly $17,000 worth of bitcoin as ransom to hackers who were able to penetrate and remotely disable the hospital's computer network. The cyber attack started on Feb. 5 and the Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center decided that it was in its best interest to pay the ransom in order to make sure that its computer network remains functional.

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The Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center paid 40 bitcoins to the hackers. The bitcoins, when converted at the current rate, amount to about $16,664. The hospital's CEO Allen Stefanek confirmed that they had indeed paid the ransom in order to stop the attack.

During the entire period that it was being hacked, the hospital's email and digital patient records were not accessible. On top of that, some internet-connected medical devices were also compromised.

In a statement, Stefanek said, "The quickest and most efficient way to restore our systems and administrative functions was to pay the ransom and obtain the decryption key. In the best interest of restoring normal operations, we did this."

Stefanek added that the hack did not affect any of the hospital's patient care operations. Also, evidence show that no sensitive patient data was compromised during the attack.

However, the hack resulted in some emergency room delays as 911 patients are being diverted to nearby hospitals and all hospital registrations and medical records were done manually by hand.

Some doctors working at the hospital claim that computers used for lab tests like documentation, work transmittal, sharing of CT and X-Ray scans were disrupted by the hack. Some hospital employees claim that several outpatients missed their scheduled treatment as a result of the hack.

According to the BBC, some patients were forced to personally pick up their medical test results since the hospital could not deliver them electronically.

At the moment, no hacker group or entity has claimed responsibility for the attack.

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