Moonlighting Nurse Struck Off, UK

Main Category: Litigation / Medical Malpractice
Also Included In: Nursing / Midwifery
Article Date: 05 Nov 2008 - 9:00 PDT

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A nurse convicted of defrauding her NHS Trust employer with false sick notes while earning money working for an agency was struck off the professional register at a hearing of the Nursing & Midwifery Council (NMC) in Cardiff.

Julia Jones, 45, from Port Talbot, West Glamorgan, had last year been sentenced to a £150 fine by Pontypridd Magistrates Court for seven charges of dishonestly claiming sickness benefits from her employer, Pontypridd and Rhonda NHS Trust, while working elsewhere and thus defrauding the Trust of more than £2,000.

The independent panel of the NMC's Conduct and Competence Committee decided that Jones was in breach of the NMC Code of Professional Conduct in a number of respects, principally by being untrustworthy.

They stated that the Welsh nurse had seriously compromised the reputation of her profession through the repeated dishonesty over a period of five months, even if the offence was not directly connected to professional practice.

Lesley Conway, spokesperson for the NMC said: "The panel also considered that her illegal absence from the NHS Trust while working elsewhere could have caused indirect harm to patients. Having seen that Jones showed no genuine expression of regret and not produced any references for consideration, they concluded that the striking-off order was the only proportionate sanction in the circumstances.

The Nursing & Midwifery Council (NMC) is the UK regulator for two professions, nursing and midwifery. To be eligible to work as a nurse or midwife in the UK, they must be registered with the NMC. There are currently more than 674,000 nurses and midwives on the register. The primary purpose of the NMC is to safeguard the health and wellbeing of the public. It does this through maintaining a register of all nurses and midwives to practise within the UK and by setting standards for their education, training and conduct.

Nursing & Midwifery Council