In what appears to be truth stranger than fiction, a New Jersey male nurse has admitted killing 30 to 40 people through unlawful digoxin injection. Because of his alarmingly high level of activity involving digoxin and the frequent accountings showing missing and unaccounted for quantities of this lethal heart drug, it's most likely that stockpiled digoxin. He had access to the digoxin compartment 27 times during the short time he was employed
The performance of administrators at Somerset Medical Center in New Jersey is particularly troubling. The hospital's computers virtually caught the nurse administering drug overdoses, but he was allowed to stay on the job and inflict more harm while the hospital conducted a low-key investigation.
Troubling clues first emerged in mid-June 2003, when a patient suffered life-threatening heart failure and blood tests found a high level of digoxin, a drug she had not been prescribed. Computer systems showed that shortly before the incident, the nurse called up the victim's medical records, even though she was not his patient, and ordered digoxin for another patient for whom it was not prescribed. The hospital's lame excuse for not moving aggressively against the serial killer nurse was that abnormal digoxin readings and incorrect medication requests by nurses are everyday occurrences.
Less than two weeks later, a priest hospitalized with pneumonia died of heart failure, and tests again showed high levels of digoxin, a drug he was not scheduled to receive. Again, the computers showed that the serial killer nurse, who was not assigned to care for the priest, had called up his medical records, ordered digoxin for another patient for whom it was not prescribed.
Even after this, the hospital simply stepped up its own investigation, and it failed to notify the police or state health officials until its hand was forced by a worried poison control expert. The killer nurse remained on the job for months. When he was finally arrested, he told the authorities that he had fatally poisoned 12 to 15 patients at Somerset Medical Center in New Jersey.
Hospitals were uniformly slow in cracking down and seldom, if ever, mentioned their suspicions to subsequent employers. Negligent administrators left him free to commit his heinous crimes.
What's wrong with our system when a healthcare professional works in seven New Jersey hospitals and nursing homes in 10 years? Are no human resources personnel calling to check references and past employment history? Are hospitals and nursing homes afraid to pass along doubts and questionable behavior to the next employer or to law enforcement? Does the bad penny keep slip through the cracks and continue as if there is nothing to stop him as their seemingly isn't?
