A nurse who failed to call a doctor when a patient's foot turned blue faces an anxious wait over the future of her career.
Stella Nthinya, 34, has been cleared of the blunders which allegedly led to the patient's foot being amputated, but still faces being struck off after being found guilty of other errors.
The hearing which will decide whether or not she will be allowed to continue practising was adjourned on Friday.
A panel at the Nursing and Midwifery Council was told that she allegedly failed to give a pensioner a week's worth of medication for deep vein thrombosis when she worked at the Southern Cross-run Newark Care Home in Port Glasgow, Inverclyde.
The patient suffered "blue foot" and his leg had to be amputated in hospital. He later died, although there is no evidence to prove this was linked to Nthinya's actions.
Nthinya admitted she had not given the patient his injection of the drug once, but insisted she had on the other four occasions. She also admitted failing to call a doctor when she discovered the man's foot had turned blue, but denied failing to inform the home's deputy manager or to pass the information on at handover.
The panel found the denied charges to be proved true. Giving evidence, then manager Mary Inglis-Davidson said a doctor should have been called as soon as the blue foot was discovered rather than the following day, particularly given the man's history of blood clots.
She added: “There had been a time delay from the blue foot being seen and the GP being contacted. From memory, it was about 12 to 18 hours between finding it and the GP's assessment. I would expect the nurse to have undertaken a certain level of assessment, to have documented that and sought medical advice.'
The panel formally dismissed the charges that the nurse had not given him the proper medication after ruling there was no case to answer due to 'insufficient evidence.'
The NMC had also claimed she had doctored the records to cover her tracks and thrown away the unused medicine, but this was also dismissed by the panel.
The hearing has been adjourned until a later date when it will be decided whether the nurse's fitness to practise is impaired and what sanction, if any, to impose. If found guilty of misconduct Nthinya could be struck off the nursing register.
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