Nurses Who Steal Narcotics and Pain Medication

Nurses play a critical role in modern healthcare. Without them many patients would either go untreated or wait endlessly for medical care. They alleviate pain and suffering on an endless scale. At the same time, they'll often endure brutal working hours, deal with short-staffed shifts, and have short-tempered supervisors. The stress can become intolerable.

Unfortunately some nurses will make regrettable choices to cope with the stress and long working hours. It starts out innocently enough but before they know it, they are addicted to narcotics. Powerful narcotics, such as fentanyl, OxyContin, Vicodin, and liquid morphine.

Where do they get these drugs? The most common route is to steal them from patients. The very patients they were entrusted to help. Patients at hospitals, nursing homes, even patients in surgical suites have had their pain medications stolen.

Nurses who steal narcotics are not limited to any age group, level of experience, nor to any one country. Cases have been documented in the United States, the United Kingdom, New Zealand, and Australia. These nurses are often repeat offenders. Some find repeat employment by hiding their employment record, others by taking a drug education course and become eligible for reinstatement. One study found that 50% of these nurses later relapsed after drug treatment.

How does this affect you - the patient? Patients recovering from surgery, wounds, or have chronic diseases can go through horrific pain. Narcotics are often prescribed for pain control. While hospitals have strict guidelines for drug control, they can be foiled by the very people who know the system. This is where the patient or a loved one entrusted to a nursing home can be subjected to agonizing pain or acquire a deadly disease. This is not a recent development.

A recent case in Denver, Colorado demonstrates how patients can be handed a death sentence by merely going in for routine surgery. While not a nurse, a surgical technician would steal fentanyl from surgical suites and then replace the drug with saline solution. She replaced the drug using needles she had used to inject herself. She was diagnosed with Hepatitis C before she was hired at the hospital. To date, 19 patients have been diagnosed with Hep. C traced directly to this surgical technician by the genetic fingerprint of the virus. Hep. C can be treated if caught in the early stages but left untreated it can cause the patient to die. This was not the first time she was caught stealing pain medication.

How can nurses be continually hired and fired? Probably due to a chronic shortage of nurses, false statements on employment applications, fear of getting sued by former employees, and the lack of a complete background check of nurses. State Boards responsible for oversight are often understaffed, overworked, face tight budgets, slow to take action, and are reluctant to take away licenses. Lack of information sharing between healthcare agencies nationwide only exacerbates the problem.

How can you tell if you are at risk? For Joe Public the answer isn't easy. Finding answers may require some detective work on your part and be extremely unwilling to have your concerns pushed aside. Healthcare workers can appear intimidating at times. Learn the signs of possible narcotics theft by a colleague or the deprivation of your loved one of their prescribed pain medications. Lives may depend upon your actions.

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