A HAMPSHIRE nurse has been suspended for six months for failing to go to the aid of a dying patient – but claims he had already seen him five times and did not want to “disturb” him.

Herbert Simondac, 36, will be subject to a review before he can resume work, a tribunal has ruled.

The Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) heard that he remained at his desk as an alarm sounded alerting him to the patient’s perilous condition.

The unnamed man was finally attended to by a student nurse at the Royal Hampshire County Hospital, Winchester, but later died.

Simondac, from Eastleigh, denied not attending the patient, not checking whether electrodes had detached, not taking his pulse, and not reading the patient’s blood pressure.

However, panel chairman Sue Sauter said: “Mr Simondac failed to provide an adequate level of care. There was no evidence of any remorse. It appears to have been deliberate.

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“The registrant had the necessary skills, knowledge and experience to understand the patient’s condition but he didn’t respond to an alarm. He didn’t carry out the appropriate visual assessment.

“The panel is concerned the registrant’s failings show deliberate misconduct and a lack of insight. He didn’t say he had learnt from the incident.”

Mrs Sauter said the panel had decided to suspend him to protect the public and to give Simondac a chance to address his failings.

At the end of the period she said there would be a review hearing to monitor his progress.

Simondac was on night duty when the patient turned blue on September 20, 2006. Monitors attached to the patient’s body showed his heart rate was in a rapid decline between 4.30am and 5am.

He told the NMC hearing that while he could hear the buzzer, he was not overly concerned.

“I had seen the patient five times that night. In fact, he was the only patient I had seen five times,” he said.

“He was quite forgetful and fidgeting at night. Leads kept coming out. I didn’t want to disturb him again.

“I came back from my break at 4am. I saw that there were no abnormal rhythms showing. I had other duties to attend to – to compare my observations with the doctor’s note – so I sat there and started doing my other jobs.

“As I looked over from where I was sat I could see loads of monitors going off. But it didn’t concern me because there were no abnormal rhythms.”

The panel was told that Simondac is currently working at the Brendoncare Park Road care home in Winchester.