A former nurse at a Western Sydney hospital has had her registration cancelled after she turned off the sound to an elderly patient's vital signs monitor while she FaceTimed family.
Geraldine Lumbo Dizon also failed to tell doctors about an irregular heart rhythm for the 85-year-old man, an hour before he was found dead, the NSW Civil and Administrative Appeals Tribunal has found.
The tribunal has cancelled Ms Dizon's nursing registration for at least 12 months, finding her guilty of professional misconduct and unsatisfactory professional conduct during one night shift during COVID-19 lockdown in July 2021.
A tribunal decision shows Ms Dizon was meant to provide treatment to the man, who was admitted to Nepean Private Hospital near Penrith on July 16, 2021 with renal and heart failure.
Despite being required to take the man's observations at six-hourly intervals on the night of July 29, 2021, Ms Dizon only checked once during a 10-hour shift.
Evidence presented by the Health Care Complaints Commission showed she also disconnected the "telemetry alarm speakers" connected to the monitoring device for five patients, including the elderly man.
At one tribunal hearing, Ms Dizon explained she turned the speaker off to stop another "confused" patient from thinking it was his doorbell, and getting out of bed.
But she did not reconnect the alarm at the end of her shift.
"At 7:07am on 30 July 2021, the heart monitor showed Patient A was bradycardic (slow heartbeat)," the decision read.
"Nursing and medical staff could not hear the alarm because the telemetry alarm speakers were still disconnected."
Seven minutes later, the man's heart monitor silently showed a "cardiac flatline", while nurses were unaware.
Other staff found the man cold and unresponsive at 7.20am.
Evidence given to the tribunal showed Ms Dizon on her phone for "more than 66 minutes on FaceTime and other items," during that night shift, which was against hospital policy.
CCTV footage submitted to the tribunal showed the woman on her phone at her desk about 15 minutes before her patient's heartbeat began to slow.
Ms Dizon submitted her phone use was "not continuous" and that she uses her phone at work to "check on my family in the Philippines".
Other complaints were that Ms Dizon did not tell colleagues about an irregular electrocardiogram (ECG) test, and admitted she was "not good at ECG reading".
The complaints commission said she had also breached Australian nurse safety protocols by working at least 70 hours a week between January and July 2021, resulting in likely severe fatigue.
Ms Dizon had worked four, 10-hour night shifts a week at Nepean Public Hospital, as well as three 10-hour shifts at Nepean Private, but denied being fatigued.
She had been registered as a nurse in Australia since 2006 and was trained at Central Luzon Doctors Hospital in the Philippines in 1997.
Her registration has been suspended since August 2021, a month after the incident.
The tribunal's decision said Ms Dizon did not attend any hearing with the Health Care Complaints Commission, claiming she had already resigned from nursing.
Healthscope Corporate, which runs 39 private hospitals across Australia, including Nepean Private Hospital, has been contacted for comment.
