Psychiatric nurse tried to discredit colleague

A Christchurch psychiatric nurse has been censured and fined $12,700 after accessing confidential information on a colleague in a bid to discredit him.

The New Zealand Health Practitioners Disciplinary Tribunal has charged John Malcolm Carrington with professional misconduct after he obtained confidential information in March 2009 from the integrated offender management system at Christchurch Men's Prison, where he worked as a registered psychiatric nurse in the at- risk unit.

In the tribunal's written findings, chairman Bruce Corkill, QC, said Carrington had tried to discredit a registered nurse, referred to as Mr T, who from "time to time" saw patients under Carrington's care.

Before his registration as a nurse, Mr T had served two jail terms for serious offences, but was approved by the Corrections Department to visit Christchurch Men's Prison.

Carrington had tried to obtain information on Mr T's criminal background after a coroner's hearing into the suicide of an inmate in Carrington's care.

In September 2008, an inquest was held into the suicide of the inmate, who was transferred from the at- risk wing to another wing. Within 24 hours of the transfer, he killed himself.

"On reviewing the provisional findings, Mr Carrington found the coroner proposed to be very critical of his nursing practice and that Mr Carrington had not completed a mental heath assessment on the patient or arranged for any other health practitioner to do so," the tribunal said.

Mr T told the coroner he was not involved in the transfer of the inmate, which the coroner accepted but Carrington believed "wholly untrue".

Carrington tried to obtain information relating to Mr T's past to show the coroner, believing it would challenge his credibility.

"The tribunal is very concerned that the information Mr Carrington was seeking was for the purpose of discrediting a fellow health professional in a very significant way," the report said.

"The information he was seeking occurred decades prior to the incidents which the coroner was reviewing and in a wholly different context . . .

"It was an unacceptable and somewhat misguided act on his part. It appears there may also have been some ill- feeling between Mr Carrington and Mr T; he said their working relationship had been strained at times."

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