Five nurses have been suspended for three weeks after oogling a male patient's genitals.
According to the Huffington Post, the incidents happened between March 31 and April 30 2017, but the offending nurses from the Denver Health Medical Center in Colorado weren't reported until May 8, 2017.
Several incidents of malicious oogling occurred while the patient was alive, yet incapacitated at the hospital, and again after he died....
A sixth nurse overheard the malicious comments of one of the five was making about the patient's genitals in May and reported the comment to hospital management. Soon after, an investigation was underway.
It was soon discovered that in one of the incidents, the nurses opened a body bag to view the man's sex organs.
According to a statement released by the Denver Health Medical Center, the police were alerted and the next of kin were contacted.
"Their actions, which violated our policies and our Code of Conduct, were promptly reported to appropriate governmental authorities, including the Denver Police Department and the Colorado State Board of Nursing.
"An internal Denver Health investigation resulted in disciplinary action against all those responsible for the incident and the patient's next of kin was notified."
Denver7 News confirmed that a police officer conferred with a prosecuter at the Denver District Attorney's Office.
"They determined there was insufficient evidence to prove a crime was committed, no charges were filed," he said. The matter was referred "back to Denver Health to handle internally."
Four of the five nurses are back at work, one is no longer at the hospital, but she was not terminated.
All five nurses have a notice of the discipline on their personnel files.
In a statement to the Huffington Post, the hospital apologized for the nurses' actions:
"Denver Health is truly sorry this happened. This incident it is not an appropriate representation of the high-quality care and compassion our clinical staff strive to provide to our patients."
Do you think this was enough? Should they have been fired?
[h/t HuffPost / Inquirer.net]
