Female Founders Series: When the EHR Goes Down: Building Real-Time Resilience Before the Next Outage

Female Founders Series: When the EHR Goes Down: Building Real-Time Resilience Before the Next Outage

Author: HealthIMPACT Live August 18, 2026 Duration: 32:14

When the EHR goes down, care doesn't stop, but the chart, the meds, and the allergies do. Chao Cheng Shorland explains why EHR downtime is a patient safety problem, not just an IT one, and how her team is working to end pen-and-paper charting during outages.

In this conversation:

  • Why EHR downtime belongs under patient safety, and how mortality risk climbs when systems go dark
  • The difference between continuity during failure and disaster recovery after failure
  • How ransomware turned downtime from a two-hour event into a 24-day average
  • What a lightweight downtime system needs to do: charting, orders, medications, ADT, and ED tracking with no user training
  • How a passive, read-only system flips to active over HL7 and syncs back when the primary EHR returns

Chao Cheng-Shorland, CEO and Co-Founder, ShelterZoom

Megan Antonelli, Chief Executive Officer, HealthIMPACT Live

Subscribe to Digital Health Talks on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you listen.

Learn more about HealthIMPACT Live events, virtual forums, and healthcare leader conversations at healthimpactlive.com.

Interested in being a guest, sponsoring, or joining the HealthIMPACT community? Visit healthimpactlive.com/digital-health-talks.


Each week, Digital Health Talks-Changemakers Focused on Fixing Healthcare brings you straight to the intersection of medicine and innovation. This isn't about abstract theories; it's a grounded conversation with the clinicians, administrators, and technology leaders who are actively redesigning systems. You'll hear their firsthand accounts of implementing tools like telehealth platforms and AI-driven analytics to tackle real-world problems-from expanding access in underserved communities to personalizing patient care. The discussions cut through the hype, focusing on practical applications of cloud infrastructure, 5G, and machine learning that are making a measurable difference today. Produced by HealthIMPACT Live, the podcast digs into the nuanced questions these changemakers face: deciding where limited resources are best invested, how to ethically leverage patient data, and what it truly takes to improve clinical outcomes. If you're curious about the tangible work being done to reshape our healthcare experience, this is a place to listen in on the honest, complex, and hopeful work of building a better system.
Author: Language: English Episodes: 50

Digital Health Talks - Changemakers Focused on Fixing Healthcare
Podcast Episodes
Five Good Things with Janae Sharp and Megan Antonelli [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 31:11
AI in healthcare is starting to deliver on its promise, from Epic's ambient documentation tools to a new AI model pulling fresh insights out of routine sleep studies. Megan Antonelli and Janae Sharp break down the good n…
Five Good Things with Janae Sharp and Megan Antonelli [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 20:18
A rapid-fire segment highlighting positive developments in digital health. Janae and Megan share insights on recent innovations, successful implementations, and emerging trends that are driving progress in healthcare tec…
Winning Mobility: How AVA Mobility Is Redefining Aging in Place [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 24:10
Join us for a conversation with Hamed Tabkhi and Mona Azarbayjani, as we explore how ForesightCares is transforming the future of aging with AI-driven mobility insights for older adults, caregivers, and clinicians. We'll…
Five Good Things with Janae Sharp and Megan Antonelli [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 23:26
A rapid-fire segment highlighting positive developments in digital health. Janae and Megan share insights on recent innovations, successful implementations, and emerging trends that are driving progress in healthcare tec…