A FORMER care home boss admitted falsifying the medical records of a diabetes patient after he was given insulin by a domestic assistant, a panel heard yesterday.

Gillian Shaw added the initials of colleagues to blank spaces on the patient’s insulin chart at Llanyravon Court Care Home in Cwmbran, the Nursing and Midwifery Council panel heard.

She also made another nurse, Berly Thomas, initialise the medication chart which appeared to show the immobile patient had not been administered insulin, the panel in Cardiff heard.

Mrs Shaw was sacked for gross misconduct by the home, but giving evidence under oath, the nurse said the unnamed patient had in fact been given the sugar-regulating drug on those dates in summer 2011.

Mrs Shaw admitted dishonesty for having falsified the Medication Administration Record chart but said she had amended it after checking the insulin had been given against a separate “record book” kept in the home. She told the panel: “It was never my intention to be misleading. I thought I was record keeping.

“I knew I shouldn’t have done it. At the time I don’t know why I did it, I put it down to stress.”

Her care home in Llanfrechfa Way was the subject of a protection of vulnerable adults (Pova) investigation at the time, the Cardiff panel heard.

The probe was launched because a “domestic assistant”, as opposed to a nurse, had given the unnamed patient A his insulin.

Mrs Shaw told the panel she had been on annual leave when the domestic assistant had administered the drug in 2011.

After being dismissed, Mrs Shaw found new employment as a staff nurse for three nights a week at Stow Park Nursing Home in Stow Park Avenue, Newport. Its manager, Dawn Harris, provided a character reference and told the panel: “She’s an excellent member of the team and I haven’t got any concerns at all.”

Mrs Shaw’s barrister, Chris Howells, stressed the unnamed patient A had not suffered any harm as a result of her actions adding the insulin records had been altered a month later.

The panel heard Mrs Shaw was suffering “extreme stress” at the time and Mr Howells said the records had been falsified in what could probably described as a “moment of madness”. Shaw faces a range of sanctions today including a suspension or being struck off.

Proceeding