HOE: BABY FOUND ON HOSPITAL FLOOR AFTER BEING LEFT UNSUPERVISED
A baby was found on the floor beside an incubator after being left unattended by a senior nurse, a hearing was told today (Weds).
Sister Oi Choo Hoe put up to 17 babies at risk by failing to arrange cover for a colleague on a break, the Nursing and Midwifery Council heard.
She ‘hardly spent any time at all in the nursery’ herself before the baby was found, it was said.
The panel heard nurseries on the Special Care Baby Unit (SCBU) at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Woolwich, southeast London, should not be left unattended for more than two minutes.
Hoe is accused of failing to provide enough nursing cover for the 17 babies in the unit’s three nurseries on the night of June 25 and 26, 2006.
Neil Moloney (CORR), for the NMC, said the baby, known as Baby A, was found on the floor of nursery room three when Hoe’s colleague returned from a scheduled break.
The baby was discovered next to an incubator after an ‘unsupervised period’, but had not suffered any injury.
It is alleged Hoe did not provide a nurse to cover the room while Fiona Goodfellow took a break at a time between 4am and 6.30am on June 26, nor did she cover the room herself.
It is claimed Hoe only made one visit to nursery three and failed to co-ordinate the four other staff on duty to ensure each nursery was covered during breaks.
Mr Moloney said: ‘Sister Hoe was in charge of the shift. This involved organising the shift so all babies were cared for properly, paperwork and answering the telephone was also undertaken.
‘In addition she was looking after babies in room two.
‘The sister in charge is responsible to ensure there is adequate cover on the unit when nurses take their breaks.
‘It is the council’s case that nurses should be present in the room with the babies unless they are required to leave the room briefly, for example to get something from the milk room.
‘But babies should not be unattended for more than two minutes.’
The hearing was told Hoe was the subject of a hospital investigation before she was charged by the NMC.
Samuel Platt, senior nurse for the critical care at the hospital, led the investigation and interviewed all staff on duty during the shift.
‘Ms Hoe’s role was to co-ordinate the shift and make sure all breaks were covered, in my opinion she failed to do this,’ he said.
‘She failed to act in a supervisory role.’
Mr Platt also studied three hours of CCTV taken from the corridor in the special care baby unit between 3.43am and 6.26am.
‘I was very surprised when I received the CCTV footage to see that during Fiona Goodfellow’s break that Ms Hoe hardly spent any time at all in nursery three,’ he added.
Hoe, who has worked at the hospital since 1977, did not attend her hospital disciplinary hearing on October 2, 2006.
Mr Moloney said she had also ‘voluntarily absented herself’ from today’s hearing but had made written submissions which ‘do not admit facts but give a response to each individual charge’.
The hearing continues.
ENDS
