Nurse deregistered for professional misconduct

The Health Practitioners Disciplinary Tribunal has recommended a former Dunedin Hospital nurse be struck off the register for falsifying patient records, failing to recheck abnormal test results and asking another nurse to "accumulate" medication for his wife.

Rabindranath Joyram was fired from the hospital's neurosurgical ward in April 2009 after he admitted forging a patient's respiration rate.

Several days earlier he administered insulin to a patient based on a "significantly out of line" blood sugar test result.

"Rather than rechecking the result, making sure the client had washed their hands or checking the calibration of the machine, Mr Joyram increased the insulin rate...and then failed to advise his supervisor that her (the patient's) blood sugar had increased or the actions he'd taken," the tribunal said.

The patient was later found drowsy and sweating.

In a disciplinary meeting with management, Mr Joyram said he had a "germ of dishonesty".

Just days after he was fired, Mr Joyram emailed a former colleague asking her to steal medication from the ward.

"My wife needs some Tramadol capsules...all you need to do is accumulate as many as you can and, if you are agreeable, to give them to me before I leave (the country)," he said.

Hospital staff later discovered the ward used three times more Tramadol than normal while Mr Joyram's wife was in the country for a holiday.

The tribunal found Mr Joyram guilty of professional misconduct and recommended his nursing registration be cancelled.

It also recommended he be formally censured and pay 40 per cent of the costs associated with the investigation and prosecution.

Mr Joyram, who trained as a nurse in Mauritius, is thought to have left the country.

- NZPA