Nurse ‘smelt of booze on her RAH shift’
Sacked worker blamed burnout for medical failings
A nurse has been rapped for turning up to work stinking of booze.
Margaret McFadyen repeatedly slurred “I’m a good nurse, I’m fit” after turning up for a shift at the intensive care unit at the Royal Alexandra Hospital.
She was sacked after a separate incident, where she administered the wrong treatment to a patient with kidney failure.
McFadyen has been hauled in front of a Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) disciplinary panel, where she admitted a slew of care failures.
A report from the hearing revealed her problem behaviour on the ward.
It stated: “The registrant was dishevelled and stated that she was not feeling alright.
“Nevertheless, the registrant asserted that she was fit to work.
“The registrant’s speech was slurred and she kept repeating ‘I’m a good nurse, I’m fit’ over and over again.
“The registrant continued to slur her words.
“She also kept closing her eyes and rocked her head from side to side as she spoke.”
McFadyen was sent home after the incident at the Corsebar Road hospital on June 9, 2014.
She was also punished for administering the wrong medicine to a renal patient and making “a number of incorrect records” on June 24, 2015.
McFadyen admitted the failures to bosses and wrote a reflective account of what went wrong, blaming “burnout” for her actions.
She said: “I acknowledge that I failed in my duty to provide adequate care to an allocated patient due to inappropriate, unacceptable and unsafe clinical practices.
“The gentleman I was looking after had multi-organ failure.
“He was attached to various machines.
“One such machine was a renal filter used to support the kidneys by way of filtering toxins from the bloodstream.
“When senior staff checked my paperwork it became evident that I had incorrectly documented figures relating to the filter machine.
“The potential for harm, I acknowledge, was high.
“I did not take all reasonable steps to protect the vulnerable people in my care.”
McFadyen was hired by a nursing agency after being dismissed.
She must work under close supervision from bosses after she avoided being struck-off and is limited to working in the NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde area.