The Unethical and Unprofessional Response by the Health Care Community in Lebanon, Ohio

"Two Caretakers Indicted for Allegedly Stealing Drugs in a Warren County, Ohio Nursing Home"

That was the headline in Cincinnati newspapers and on TV and radio news in the tristate area. As I read the story, I thought back to my experiences over the past 19 years.

The first thing that jumped out at me was the comment by the executive director of the nursing home. He stated they contacted the police who then watched the nurses over the next 2 years.

Excuse me? WATCHED them for TWO YEARS!?

Why? To gather evidence in order to make an arrest and seek a successful prosecution. Why would you not intervene sooner? If these nurses were addicted to opioids, why would you allow the disease to continue to progress, risk the well being of those entrusted to their care, and possibly allow the nurse...your employee and colleague...to possibly cause a potential auto accident or die from an accidental overdose?

Would they watch an employee with signs of tuberculosis, swine flu, MRSA, or other illness to see if they would steal antibiotics or other medications to deal with their illness? Would they put the residents at risk for infection or harm to catch the nurse steeling medications or other hospital equipment? Of course not. So why is it permissible to allow them to continue diverting opioids in order to get enough evidence for an arrest and conviction?

Easy answer. Few people, including doctors and nurses, believe addiction is a disease. They receive little education regarding the disease during training. Few nurses recognize the signs and symptoms in a colleague. Even if they do they rarely intervene for fear of being wrong, or harming the nurse's career. They wait until they can no longer ignore the signs and then they terminate them, report them to the police or both. Instead of intervening in order to get them out of the clinical area and into treatment, they eliminate the "problem" by firing them. This allows the disease to continue to progress. It also allows an impaired professional to go to another facility where they may harm clients or themselves.

The Code of Ethics for Nurses is very specific about the impaired nurse. Statement 3.6 says the colleagues of an impaired nurse are ethically required to intervene in order to protect the patients and to advocate for the appropriate treatment and rehabilitation of the impaired nurse. This advocacy also includes appropriate and fair legal response.

None of this happened in the incident in Lebanon, Ohio. They placed residents at risk in order to gather evidence for prosecution. They allowed a chronic, progressive, potentially fatal disease to progress. They placed the lives of innocent bystanders AND the lives of the nurses in jeopardy in order to look tough in the "war on drugs".

There are no winners when this happens...only losers. he biggest losers are the nurse, their family, and society at large.

The only real casualty in the war on drugs are those unlucky enough to have the disease.