Wednesday 27th August 2008
The discovery of controlled drugs being diluted or replaced with water at Christchurch Hospital has sparked a police investigation.
Hospital staff discovered the misuse of the liquid pain medication on some wards, but the Canterbury District Health Board yesterday said it was unclear how long it had been occurring.
Christchurch Hospital general manager Mark Leggett said a nurse made the discovery, but he declined to give any information on the type of medication or the number of patients and wards affected as it was part of the police investigation.
Leggett said access to controlled drugs on hospital wards was restricted to registered nurses.
Hospital staff were checking all medication to ensure patients received correct doses, he said.
A hospital board spokeswoman said it was not appropriate to comment on whether patients were at risk. She said the issue concerned levels of pain management.
Detective Senior Sergeant David Harvey, of the Christchurch police, said the investigation was in its early stages, and officers began speaking to hospital staff yesterday.
A former doctor at Christchurch Hospital, who declined to be named, said dangerous drugs, normally opiates, were kept in locked safes on each ward. The safes had one key that was normally kept by a charge nurse, he said.
People, normally nurses, checking drugs out of the safes had to get the key, do a pre-count of what was in the safe and check it against a log book.
The person then took the required drugs and had someone else confirm the amount taken and note it in the book.
Drugs were normally double-checked before administration to patients, he said.
The doctor said it would not be hard to steal drugs "if you were in cahoots with someone".
Diluting after theft would also be easy as intravenous cannulas were often flushed with saline before drugs were administered, so the means to top up vials of drugs would be at hand.
Reported cases of drug theft from hospitals appear to be uncommon.