When Angelique Knight told police she had been abused as a child by a Tasmanian nurse, she says she received the reply: "There's nothing we can do, we can't charge a dead person."
Ms Knight gave evidence on Tuesday at an inquiry examining state government responses to child sexual abuse in the public service.
It has for a week and a half focused on Launceston General Hospital and James Geoffrey Griffin, who took his own life in 2019 after being charged with child sexual abuse.
Health officials have acknowledged "catastrophic" system failures in the handling of accusations made against Griffin, who worked in the children's ward for almost 20 years.
Ms Knight, who spent much of her childhood in hospital with chronic autoimmune conditions, first encountered Griffin when she was 14.
"I hated him. I remember him coming in and (he) was very touchy-feely," she told the inquiry.
Ms Knight said her mother made a complaint against Griffin but "nothing really happened" and he continued to "care" for her.
She said he would touch her, including in the company of other nurses who brushed off concerns with "that's just Jim, he's a touchy-feely kind of guy'.
Ms Knight said the abuse became "intimate".
She went to police in 2019 after learning of Griffin's death in a newspaper report, but was left feeling humiliated and disgusted and without offers of support.
"(A lady at the police station) said, 'Sorry, there's nothing we can do, we can't charge a dead person. I'm sorry that this has happened'," Ms Knight told the inquiry.
She said she emailed the hospital but only received a "generic" response from director of clinical services Peter Renshaw and no apology.
"I don't think (an apology) would change anything for me but it would go a long way knowing someone is taking some responsibility about what happened, because it was happening under their noses," she said.
The state government on Sunday announced an urgent review of child safety governance and human resource processes at the hospital and flagged leadership changes.
Survivors have told of being groomed and abused by Griffin, who was the subject of documented boundary breaches at the hospital.
Social worker Kylee Pearn informed hospital human resources in 2011 Griffin had abused her as a child. She said she was told nothing could be done without a conviction.
Department of Health secretary Kathrine Morgan-Wicks, who will give substantive evidence in August, pledged "large-scale change" to ensure serious complaints are independently reviewed.
"I am personally devastated by the lack of care or support offered to victim-survivors at the time they reported abuse," she told the inquiry.
"(As well as) the lack of proper procedure or protocol to record the account or keep records, the lack of relevant training on interviewing and investigation and detection of grooming.
"This is wrong and an absolute failure by our health system for which I am deeply sorry."
Ms Morgan-Wicks offered individual apologies to survivors and those who had reported concerns.
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