‘I was threatened with the sack for trying to help’

A FRONTLINE Covid nurse has tendered his resignation after he was threatened with the sack for trying to help patients get the best treatment.

Staff nurse Gavin Ayre, 52, has worked at St John’s Hospital, Livingston, for 17 years. He worked on a general medicine ward but it was transformed into a Covid assessment ward at the peak of the pandemic.

He said: “The whole thing was a mess – nobody knew what they were doing. The whole thing was pretty much nurse-led.”

Against this chaotic background, Gavin accessed information about patients in A&E who had icons on their records identifying them as possible Covid patients.

He said: “They had to meet certain criteria to be sent to our ward so I would check to see who was coming. Some patients earmarked for our ward had nothing Covid about them so I would make sure they weren’t brought to us.”

Months later, the IT department, checking records, discovered Gavin had accessed records of A&E patients who, technically, were not in his care at the time. And, therefore, he was investigated for data protection breaches.

He said: “The whole point was to establish how well or unwell these patients were because if they came up they may have to wait to be seen by a doctor for hours.

“They were saying it was a data confidentiality breach and I can understand that in the real world. But these were not normal times. I was just trying do my job and do what was best for the patients. We were in the middle of a pandemic and it was chaos.”

Gavin said: “My union rep has told me I am going to be sacked, which will mean I will lose my nursing registration so I will no longer be able to be a nurse anywhere.

“I have been told my only other option is to resign and if I do there will be no further consequences so I will be able to continue nursing.

“I am resigning because I have no other choice but I don’t want to do it because I have been on that ward for 11 years and I love my job.

“But now I am just the fall guy and I can’t understand why that is. The whole thing just beggars belief.”

Dr Tracey Gillies, Executive Medical Director, NHS Lothian, said: “While we do not comment on individual members of staff, we take the security of information and confidentiality of medical records extremely seriously.”