Nurse ‘failed to ask right questions’

An experienced nurse whose mistake at a doctor’s surgery in Shropshire led to a baby being aborted live at 22 weeks failed to ask the patient the right questions, a tribunal heard.

Karyn Probert, 42, did not realise her patient was pregnant when she gave her a powerful contraceptive jab, it is claimed.

The woman was a month pregnant when GP’s nurse Probert injected her in May 2005 at the Station Road Surgery in Ludlow.

The injection can stop periods completely and the woman demanded an abortion when she realised she was pregnant four months later.

Doctors believed the woman was 16 weeks pregnant.

But when the abortion was carried out the child was consequently several weeks older than expected and was born alive with a heartbeat and died soon after.

Probert is facing misconduct charges at the Nursing and Midwifery Council, over her alleged failure to establish if the woman was pregnant and for altering records of the consultation.

Probert denies any wrongdoing and claims what she added to the record after the mistake emerged was an honest reflection of the questions she asked at the time.

Rosemary Rollason, for the NMC, told the hearing that Probert saw more than a hundred patients a year for contraception advice and should have been aware of the importance of asking Mrs A about her menstruation.

She said: “Probert does not dispute the fact that the patient was pregnant and it’s clear that she accepts that she did not record certain notes at the consultation, particularly the date of her last menstrual period.

“That is very important in deciding whether the patient was suitable for this contraceptive, which is 99 per cent effective.

“Nor does she dispute the fact that she did not make this important entry.”

The panel also heard from GP Dr Karon Morton, who conducted an investigation at the surgery.

Probert, of Eardisland, Herefordshire, denies failing to establish whether the patient was pregnant.

The hearing continues on Monday.

By Andy Richardson