I would like some advise on whether I should stay at my job. I have been suspicious of my direct supervisor (I work the night shift in a 250 bed nursing home/rehab facility) of stealing narcotics for a while. She has lost her license in two states for abusing narcotics/stealing them from the hospital, and this is the only place that she has worked since getting back her right to work in this state. A couple people have reported her where we work now, but she always passes the drug test. Whenever I work her behavior is irratic, and at times she appears "high". She always seems to be needing to borrow Dilaudid from my Wing for other wings, and even though some patients on my wing have dilaudid prn they never ask for it from me; but when she works they want it every 4 hours. Last night I went to get a patient 2mg Dilaudid and found that the narcotics card had been taped at the bottom, and the pills looked a little different. Turns out, after some investigation the pills were not dilaudid, they were Atenenol 25 mg! Somebody had replaced all of the pills; I went straight to my supervisor; even though she is the first one I suspected, and was the last one on that cart, and reported it. She told me that pharmacy must have made an error and sent the wrong pills. I demanded that our DON be called, whom she is friends with, and reported it to her as well. The package was put in the DON's office and I was told not to bring it up with anyone or worry about it. I am uncomfortable that my place of employment would cover something like this up; not sure what my next step should be.
it bothers me that we havent had an update....she was supposed t work last nite, i hope she is ok....
Yeah it does seem kind of ominous...maybe she was told to not discuss it anymore (hopefully by somebody who is not a threat). There have been a lot of posts saying that she could be in danger and I suppose that's a very real possibility; however, I still maintain that chances of this actually being life-threatening are very, very slim, despite our knowledge of what lengths junkies go to feed their habits.
Hi Susiesmith21, I'm sorry to hear you are going through this at your place of employment. Dilauded is an extremely addicting and powerful drug, one of the most commonly abused among healthcare professionals. My best advice to you is to leave this establishment- the sooner the better. As far as reporting anything to your board of nursing or dept. of health- If you believe any patients or residents are at risk to be harmed, it is your duty as a nurse and patient advocate to report this. If you feel you can't stop this behavior by alerting your DON, then trust me- the dept. of health and the law will. Tampering with consumer products is a federal crime and this offender is likely to wind up with a prison sentence. You deserve a better job.
Hi Susiesmith21, I'm sorry to hear you are going through this at your place of employment. Dilauded is an extremely addicting and powerful drug, one of the most commonly abused among healthcare professionals. My best advice to you is to leave this establishment- the sooner the better. As far as reporting anything to your board of nursing or dept. of health- If you believe any patients or residents are at risk to be harmed, it is your duty as a nurse and patient advocate to report this. If you feel you can't stop this behavior by alerting your DON, then trust me- the dept. of health and the law will. Tampering with consumer products is a federal crime and this offender is likely to wind up with a prison sentence. You deserve a better job.
Best of luck
How is it that someone joins AN, and their very first post is a response to a five year old thread?!
You could make a report to the state BON or make an anonymous report to the state BON. I, personally, would not let it go. I recently saw myself that some DON's do have friends that they protect. They are human, and certainly not all of them are good DON's.
Oops! I'm a new member, but have been sifting through this site for many years. Cut a nurse some slack and lighten up. Was searching a topic that concerns me and found poor Susiesmith15's post- guess I overlooked the date. Maybe somebody in a similar situation to her's can read the thread and my post- trust me- this kind of stuff is still happening out there somewhere. I hope Susiesmith15 has moved on to a better place after 5 years!
CoffeeRTC, BSN, RN
3,734 Posts
SRSLY, where is the administrator in all of this? I re read the first post and didn't see mention. Are they aware of the DON or Sups past?
I'd love an update from the OP............