Staff nurse Smith was under pressure on a busy children's ward and failed to properly check the dosage of antibiotics prescribed by a junior doctor for a child with suspected meningitis. The child was given a dosage 1000 times the normal amount and died of renal failure as a result. Nurse Smith could potentially be found liable for negligence resulting in harm. While trying to expedite lunches for patients, nurse Smith entered the kitchen in violation of rules and knocked into a cook, causing hot gravy to spill and burn both of them. The trust may be liable to the injured cook, and nurse Smith could attempt to sue her employer as well.
4. Duty of care A neighbour is a person so closely connected with and directly affected by (proximate to) my act (or omission) that I should have had them in mind when I committed the act (or omission).
23. Staff nurse Smith was under considerable pressure on a children's ward. A spate of very seriously ill patients being admitted and a few absences of staff had increased her workload and put strain on the ward. A junior doctor wrote up a four year old with suspected meningitis for a high dose of antibiotics and told the staff nurse he was prescribing a higher dose than was usual due to the severity of the condition. Normally Staff nurse Smith would have checked the dose in the BNF, but since they were so busy she took the doctors word for it and gave the higher than normal dose. The child went in to renal failure and died. Post mortem reveled the child had been given one thousand fold the normal dose.
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