Foreign nurses who barely spoke English and had no psychiatric experience lacked the skills to work at Oakden’s mental health facility, former workers claim. Former psychiatric nurses said staff shortages, lack of maintenance and management issues plaguing the Older Persons Mental Health Service at Oakden go as far back as 2000.
May 2, 2017
The s.185 (Enterprise agreement) application by The Salvation Army (Queensland) Property Trust atf The Social Work T/A The Salvation Army Australia Eastern Territory for its Salvation Army Queensland Social Services – Nurse Enterprise Agreement 2016 has been ratified by Fair Work Commissioner Johns sitting in Melbourne on 28 April 2017.
May 2, 2017
Nurses are calling for the State Government to provide free blood tests amid revelations excess lead levels were last month found in water within the QEII Medical Centre, including Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital. Australian Nurses Federation WA State secretary Mark Olson today said he had been repeatedly contacted by nurses concerned for their own safety and the safety of their patients at Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital.
May 2, 2017
A s.185 (Enterprise agreement) application by Lifehouse Australia as trustee for Lifehouse Australia Trust for its Lifehouse Medical Physicists Agreement 2017 has been approved by Commissioner Johns in Melbourne on 28 April 2017.
May 2, 2017
The head of a federal aged care inspection agency says he wants answers as to how his organisation allowed the Oakden mental health facility in Adelaide to continue operating following an audit. The Australian Aged Care Quality Agency accredited the Makk and McLeay aged care home in February last year. This month, the South Australian Government announced the facility would be shut down after an investigation uncovered mistreatment of patients dating back a number of years. The agency’s chief executive, Nick Ryan, visited the home on Thursday and said it was one of the “poorest examples” of nursing homes he had experienced. “I’m deeply concerned by what I observed [on Thursday],” he said.
May 2, 2017
Two nurses who dragged an elderly woman’s cold, lifeless body from a nursing home fountain in a bid to cover up a potential drowning have been given a slap on the wrist. Lea Sanchez was this week let off with a caution, and Catherine Condon will be back at work within three months after being suspended. She must also undertake an ethics and record-keeping education program. They were found to have covered up crucial details about a 76-year-old woman’s death in May 2011 from her family, police, doctors and other staff. The Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal found Ms Condon and Ms Sanchez guilty of professional misconduct after being told the elderly woman was left lying dead in the fountain for almost an hour before she was discovered by the nurses. The media has been gagged from printing the name of the five-star aged-care facility, where the woman was “found lying face down in a fountain”, for legal reasons. Ms Condon instructed Ms Sanchez and other staff to move the 76-year-old dementia sufferer from the fountain to her room, dry her body, dress her and put her in bed. Barrister Rachel Ellyard, who was representing the Nursing and Midwifery Board of Australia, told VCAT: “In the immediate aftermath of (the woman) being found, no full account of the circumstances of her being found were given to relevant people.” Ms Condon and Ms Sanchez knowingly faked the victim’s medical reports and did not tell the woman’s family or her doctor how she had really died in the fountain. Night staff were told the woman, who also cannot be named for legal reasons, died of a heart attack in the courtyard. Police and the Coroner were only told of the accidental death when a carer, who first saw the woman in the fountain from a window above, suspected a cover-up. The carer was sacked the next day. It was only after CCTV footage was discovered by authorities that the truth was revealed, and triggered a coronial inquest, which found Ms Condon the “leader in the cover-up”. The pair has continued to work in aged care since the cover-up. In his findings, senior VCAT member Ian Proctor said Ms Condon hid the details from police. Victoria Police confirmed neither Ms Sanchez nor Ms Condon had received any criminal charges over the matter, which has taken almost six years to be brought before VCAT
May 1, 2017
Mark Moran at Little Bay Pty Ltd is set to defend a s.394 (Application for unfair dismissal remedy) before Commissioner Johns in his Sydney chambers at 3.30 pm today (Gebremeskel).
May 1, 2017
A s.185 (Enterprise agreement) application by Medibank Private Limited for its Medibank Enterprise Agreement 2016 has finally been stamped by Commissioner Roe in Melbourne on the 28 April 2017.
