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A nurse was fired from a Missouri hospital after she was caught stealing fentanyl meant for patients, then she found a new nursing job and stole more of the drug, according to federal authorities.
Now the former nurse from Cape Girardeau has been sentenced to four years of probation after pleading guilty to obtaining a controlled substance by fraud, records show.
In early 2020, pharmacy staff at a St. Louis area hospital flagged the nurse “for withdrawing two to three times more fentanyl than her peers,” according to a March 9 news release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for Eastern District of Missouri.
Authorities said she had been taking fentanyl from the hospital’s security cabinets used to store and dispense patient medications, according to the government’s sentencing memorandum.
“She was drug tested on February 4, 2020 in connection with her aberrant fentanyl usage, multiple discrepancies in her documentation of her fentanyl usage, and her inability to account for the same,” prosecutors said. She tested positive for the synthetic opioid, and she was fired from the hospital.
McClatchy News reached out to the defense attorney representing the former nurse and was awaiting a response.
The Missouri Board of Nursing opened an investigation after the woman’s drug test and interviewed the former nurse, authorities said.
She said she took medication from the hospital “on multiple occasions” and “acknowledged that her conduct jeopardized patient safety if it had caused her to commit nursing errors,” according to the sentencing memorandum.
Because the woman said she was receiving addiction treatment — and the treatment center confirmed her participation — she did not lose her nursing license, authorities said.
She got a new job with a hospital intensive care unit in October 2021, but was fired in January 2022 “for reasons related to her fentanyl usage at the hospital,” authorities said.
In one example, authorities said she noted that she gave a patient 27 doses of 25 micrograms of fentanyl in a 15-minute interval — though the hospital policy states “if a patient does not receive pain relief after three such doses, the patient should be placed on an intravenous drip of the medication.”
She was suspended and drug tested, authorities said. This time, she tested negative for fentanyl.
The hospital still fired her because the hospital’s drug cabinet records “indicated that she frequently retained partially used vials of medication in violation of hospital policy,” authorities said. She was also accused of trying to disguise records to hide what drugs were stolen.
Cape Girardeau is about 115 miles southeast of St. Louis.