Firing overturned for nurse who stole narcotics
TORONTO — A nurse who stole opioid painkillers and other drugs from a Toronto hospital for seven years, then risked harming patients by doctoring their records in the coverup, has been ordered rehired by the facility.
The just-released arbitration ruling is one of the most dramatic in a string of cases nationwide involving health-care workers caught pilfering narcotics — but with starkly different outcomes for the employees.
While many have returned to work after rehabilitation with their records relatively unblemished, others have been disciplined, fired or even prosecuted criminally.
In the Toronto case decided last week, arbitrator Norm Jesin concluded the serial thefts were motivated by addiction, a disability he said gives the nurse human-rights protection.
In overturning the unnamed woman’s dismissal, Jesin also cited the fact she eventually sought professional help, was in remission and will return to work under a set of conditions designed to protect Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre.
Nurses elsewhere have had their dismissals or suspensions overturned on similar grounds.
But one leading expert says those drug-purloining workers should not emerge unscathed.
“To absolve someone of something like that, I find very difficult,” said Dr. Harry Vedelago, a prominent addictions physician at Homewood Health in Guelph, Ont. He stressed that he was not commenting on any specific case.
“Those individuals have to make some kind of restitution, have to accept the consequences of their behaviours … It’s much like somebody who drinks alcohol and assaults somebody or gets into a car accident.”
Vedelago also cited research that indicates health professionals are no more likely than others to have substance-abuse problems, but tend to stand out because they are in a position of trust.