Causes of losing your license?

[Libby1987]

I'm not asking about drug use, intentional fraud etc but due to clinical/medical errors.

We have a new nurse (graduated 2 yrs ago and new to HH) who is afraid of making a mistake and losing her license. I asked if she knew of anyone who had and they were related to illegal behavior.

What type of errors has anyone lost their license? Missing an important finding? Med error? Unintentional physical harm to a patient?

[Babzuptown]

A nurse that I graduated with was married to someone who had graduated the year before us. He was working as an RN when he kidnapped her and held a gun to her head in a remote, mountain area. She was leaving him. She managed to talk her way out of it and escaped with her life. He lost his license!

[joemomma35]

Many state boards of nursing will let you look up online what the cause of license actions were for nurses. Usually they're drug/alcohol related, not paying child support or loans in the states we talked about, etc. I haven't heard of any from med errors or basic mistakes.

[elkpark]

I knew a nurse years ago who lost her license after an individual died in restraints while she was the RN responsible (this was in a psych setting). She did get her license back several years later, and resumed her career.

[TheCommuter, BSN, RN]

Libby1987 said:

What type of errors has anyone lost their license? Missing an important finding? Med error? Unintentional physical harm to a patient?

Revocation of nursing licensure over medication errors, unintentional harm, or deviations in the standard of care is exceedingly rare.

Statistically, the lion's share of nursing licenses are revoked due to issues revolving around addiction: impaired practice, theft, diversion, and/or failure to complete the terms of impaired nurse programs as contractually agreed.

[caliotter3]

When I have taken the time to read disciplinary actions on the internet, most of the time that I can recall, people reported for med/practice errors were given some type of education, probationary status consequences; or the med/practice errors were listed in a cavalcade of charges including juicer tidbits that called for the more severe punishments. Outright revocation typically occurs when the accusations are of a more serious nature, and even then, many times there is a probationary period. The person gets their license revoked when they don't comply with the probation. That seems to be the trend that I have noticed.

[dirtyhippiegirl, BSN, RN]

The CA BON is one that lists everything on their website. You can sift through to see what nurses lose their licenses for. Like cali said -- very few instances where a single med error causes someone to lose their license. It's usually a string of errors that occur despite remediation or a failure to comply with probationary requirements that are occasionally imposed on the more serious one-time med errors.

[Morainey, BSN, RN]

Lots of narcotic diversion and stealing from patients in my neck of the woods. It's been awhile since I looked but no one lost their license for forgetting to cut a metoprolol in half.

[KelRN215, BSN, RN]

I only know of one person who lost her nursing license- my best friend's sister-in-law. She diverted narcotics from the prison that she worked at and then failed to show up for her hearing at the BoN. Patient care issues would have to be really egregious for a nurse to lose her license.

[Mavrick, BSN, RN]

She may not lose her license for a med error but any kind of disciplinary action can bring a whole heapin' helpin' of pain in the butt from education requirements, to probation with restrictions, to a fine and you just don't want that kind of attention from your friendly BoN.

So, do your job, make your student loan payments, don't endanger the public and quit being neurotic about it.

[Anonymous865]

Since so many people on here seem to live in fear of losing their license, I got curious and started looking at the monthly BON report for my state on disciplinary actions. It seems that

- failure to pay child support, failure to pay student loan, working while impaired, and diverting narcotics will get your license suspended

- failure to maintain a record for each patient which accurately reflects the nursing problems and interventions for the patient and/or failure to maintain a record for each patient which accurately reflects the name and title of the nurse providing care and/or making false or materially incorrect, inconsistent or unintelligible entries in the record will get you probation and some continuing education in nursing ethics and record-keeping

- failing to take appropriate action in safeguarding the patient from incompetent health care practices and failing to report through proper channels, facts known to the individual regarding incompetent, unethical or illegal practice of any health care provider will get you probation and continuing education in nursing ethics, record keeing, and patient safety measures

- getting convicted of certain crimes (theft, rape, murder) can get your license suspended

- intentionally or negligently causing a physical or emotional injury to a patient, and failure to keep accurate records, and engaging in acts of dishonesty which relate to the practice of nursing (all part of the same incident) will get you probation and continuing education in patient safety, use of Hoyer lift, nursing ethics, and record-keeping. (It looks like you have to cause an injury and try to cover it up to get into trouble with the BON.)

Most months the only action taken by the BON are for failure to pay child support or student loans. The next most common finding by the BON is for working impaired and/or diversion.

[NICUmiiki, DNP, NP]

I check the disciplinary bulletin every time it is released and the only things I see people lose their licenses for are not cooperating with the Recovery Nurses Program.