A NURSE who put sterile water into syringes in a hospital to hide the fact that he had taken drugs from the syringes has been struck off the nurses’ register.
The staff nurse, who also altered labelling on a syringe or syringes to conceal the fact that he had taken the drugs, was found guilty of professional misconduct in one of six fitness to practise decisions just published by An Bord Altranais.
The hospital where Joel Reyes Vallejo worked is not named in the nursing board’s decision, which the High Court has confirmed.
The allegations proven against the nurse, whose registered pin number was 84315, occurred on a number of occasions on or before October 16th, 2007. One of the drugs taken for his own use was fentanyl (a medicine similar to but more potent than morphine).
In another case, a nurse who failed to record the condition of a patient in July 2005 and failed to call the medical team to review the patient but later met the patient’s family outside the hospital and briefed them “in an exaggerated fashion causing them unnecessary stress and anxiety”, was also struck off the register.
Teddy C Manalo, registered pin number 83446, was found guilty of professional misconduct for asking the family of the patient to deny their meeting with him and for asking them “to give untruthful information” concerning the condition of their relative.
Four other nurses were censured by the nursing board but their names will remain on the register.
They include nurse Allan Ray Ramos Bal, registered pin number 84205, who was found guilty of professional misconduct for playing computer games and/or used a mobile phone and/or stretching out on chairs instead of attending to his nursing duties on night duty in February and March 2005. He was also found guilty of treating patients in a rough and disrespectful manner in June 2006.
Enjoy Villanueva Ronquillo Berey (registered pin number 96715) was censured for submitting a forged reference to a nursing agency which she had completed herself in July 2007.
Vinaya C Augustine (registered pin number 109007), who failed to administer a prescribed pain-relieving drug to a patient in September 2006 but forged the signature of a nursing colleague to suggest she had witnessed that the patient got her prescribed medication was also censured.
Mary O’Brien (registered pin number 88983), who attended for night duty under the influence of alcohol in December 2007, was also censured.