POWER: DRUNK NURSE PASSED OUT ON ELDERLY PATIENT’S SOFA
A nurse was found passed out following a drinking binge at the home of a patient with severe dementia, a hearing was told.
Care workers found Kathleen Power, 60, unconscious and smelling of alcohol on a sofa at the elderly man’s address in Tenterdon, Kent.
When they eventually managed to wake her, Power was still too drunk to hold a conversation, the Nursing and Midwifery Council heard.
On being helped to her feet she fell on the floor and started crying.
Power was working as a live-in nurse for Kent agency Consultus Care and Nursing at the time of the incident on December 28, 2006.
Her patient, identified only as Patient A, was in the late stages of Alzheimer’s disease and needed 24-hour help.
He was looked after by staff from Tonbridge-based Consultus and The Care Company in nearby Weald, near Sevenoaks, Kent.
Victoria Burke, owner of The Care Company, was called to the scene by Patient A’s night care worker at 8am.
He had been due to hand over to Power at 7.30am but explained she wasn’t capable of working.
Mrs Burke said: ‘On arriving at Patient A’s home, I saw that Miss Power appeared to be drunk. She was fast asleep on the sofa and couldn’t be woken up, and I could smell alcohol.
‘When she did wake up she seemed disorientated and her words were slurred. She then became very distressed and lay on the floor and started crying.
‘My main concern was to ensure the client was calm and safe.’
Power was living in Spain at the time, but made regular trips to the UK for nursing jobs.
She had been due to look after Patient A from December 23 to January 11, providing companionship and helping with his personal hygiene, cooking, shopping and medication.
But instead she flew home on the afternoon of December 28, after Mrs Burke booked her a ticket.
Mrs Burke added: ‘At first she couldn’t tell me what the problem was, but after a while she started talking.
‘She was telling me about personal problems at home and she was having trouble with the fact that the client was a very difficult client.
‘That’s when I said to her “Do you think you ought to go home?” She wasn’t in a fit state to work that day.’
The nurse was still too drunk to pack up her own things, so Mrs Burke offered to do it herself.
She went up to Power’s bedroom, where she found three or four empty spirit bottles in the bottom of a wardrobe.
Power had also failed to fill in Patient A’s nursing records during the time she was staying with him.
But Sheila Hewitt, nursing manager for Consultas, said her employee had previously been ‘reliable and diligent.’
She added: ‘She came on our books in October 2005, she had been with eight clients and their feedback had all been very positive.
‘I was aware that some of Patient A’s friends thought that her nursing care had been excellent.’
Power is not attending a misconduct hearing in central London and has not formally admitted or denied charges of being drunk on duty and failing to fill in Patient A’s nursing records.
The hearing continues.
ENDS
