- Nurse convicted of drugging patients
- Conspired with colleague
- Apology from hospital CEO
A nurse convicted of administering drugs to patients to “maintain their composure and silence.”
Preston Crown Court heard that between February 2017 and November 2018, Catherine Hudson, 54, administered unprescribed sedatives to two patients at Blackpool Victoria Hospital to facilitate an “easy life.”
Additionally, the jury found her guilty of conspiring with Charlotte Wilmot, 48, to administer a sedative to a third patient.
Hudson was acquitted of maltreating two additional patients.
During the trial, the court learned that Hudson texted a colleague that she had sedated a patient “within an inch of her life” and that she “bet she’s flat for a week, ha ha.”
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The jury was informed that she had used various substances, including the potentially fatal insomnia medication zopiclone, administered improperly.
In September, Prosecutor Peter Wright KC said Hudson and Wilmot “treated patients with contempt rather than care and compassion.”
“After a student nurse witnessed events during her work placement at the hospital’s stroke unit in November 2018 and reported them to the authorities, the duo were investigated.”
The student reported to the police that Hudson informed her that the patient had a do-not-resuscitate order “so she wouldn’t be opened up if she died or… came to harm” when she voiced concerns about the administration of zopiclone.
A review of Hudson and Wilmot’s communications uncovered a substantial number of exchanges in which patients and their families were described in “the most derogatory and cruel terms,” according to Lancashire Police.
The force said Hudson’s victim was Glasgow native Aileen Scott, who was vacationing in Blackpool before being hospitalised.
A representative stated that the stroke unit’s restrictions on prescription-only medications were “so lax” that employees would “self-medicate or steal drugs to distribute to others.”
After the verdicts, Judge Robert Altham sentenced Hudson to prison, adding the nurse “must obviously consist of immediate custody.”
Specialist prosecutor Karen Tonge stated following the verdicts that the pair’s conduct was “devious and callous” and that they had shown “complete disregard for the patients entrusted to their care.”
Detective Chief Inspector Jill Johnston further stated that the two individuals “managed the patients without regard or empathy, medicating them to suppress their distress and laughing when they inflicted harm on them to facilitate an easier shift.”
Trish Armstrong-Child, CEO of Blackpool Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust, apologized to the families of Hudson’s victims, stating that “unacceptable and inappropriate conduct and practices were occurring at the time.”
She stated that the trust had made “significant improvements across a range of issues. Including staffing, managing medicine, and creating a more respectful culture.”
Hudson and Wilmot are scheduled to be sentenced on December 13 and 14.
