Cape Town - A nurse who was dismissed in September last year for administering an injection to a patient without a written instruction from a doctor has been reinstated after she won her arbitration at the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration.
Commissioner S Goldschmidt had to determine whether Nicolette Naylor’s dismissal was substantively and procedurally fair. The Medicross Healthcare Group argued that her actions placed the patient’s life in danger. But Chantelle van Merwe from the Solidarity Union, representing Naylor, argued that the nurse confirmed that she had not made a copy of the script.
After listening to arguments from both sides, Goldschmidt said: “The applicant’s dismissal was procedurally fair, but substantively unfair. Medicross Healthcare Group must reinstate Naylor to her former position and on the same terms and conditions as prior to her dismissal. She must commence her duties on August 5. She must be be paid retrospective pay of R108432, less any statutory deductions by no later than August 15.”
From the documents presented it appeared that Naylor administered an injection to a patient without a script and that the billing process indicated that Naylor had not seen a doctor.
Recalling the events of August 13, 2018, Naylor said in papers: “At 3pm a patient Cindy Truter came in. She had a migraine and came in for an XEPO to help her cope with the headache. I had phoned in to the receptionist to get her doctor to write a script. “The script was on the file, together with lots of other paperwork. What happened to the script is that the patient placed it in her bag because she still had to get other medication listed on the script.”
Naylor managed to get hold of the patient a week later but had already handed the script to the pharmacy. The script was mailed to Naylor and in her statement said when she handed it to the chairperson of the hearing, her response was “it was a little too late”.
@TheCapeArgus