A nurse struck off for a drugs blunder claimed today (Friday) that the mistakes she made happened in hospitals all the time.

Margaret Silver said that in her experience nurses were under such pressure because of staff shortages and a lack of resources that errors were common.

Her comments came after the UK Central Council for Nursing, Midwifery and Health Visiting found her guilty on two counts of misconduct and banned her from working as a nurse.

However, hospital trust bosses said they always closely monitored clinical care and took action if standards slipped.

The 54-year-old from Havengore in Pitsea, who had never been suspended before in her 30-year career as a nurse, said she would not be appealing against the decision because she had had enough of the profession.

Although she disputed a finding by the council that she wrongly recorded the administration of an anti depressant to a patient in Lister ward at Orsett Hospital, she did accept that she had mistakenly injected another patient with insulin.

However she added: "While I accept it was wrong it was not something which would have caused serious side effects.

"But what I did is hardly uncommon. Nurses are under more and more pressure to do their jobs.

"There are fewer staff and the resources they have must be stretched further.

"Mistakes are going to happen. It's not right, I know, but until the Government or managers start shaking up the NHS and giving it the resources it needs these mistakes are going to continue."

A spokeswoman for the South Essex Mental Health and Community Care NHS Trust said: "Although we cannot discuss specific disciplinary issues we would like to assure the public that clinical care is closely monitored to ensure it meets appropriate standards."

By James Taylor

Reporter's e-mail: james.taylor@notes.newsquest.co.uk

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