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Newcastle Herald
Newcastle Herald
National
Madeline Link

Pharmacist's rego suspended after she stole 'an awful lot' of tablets

REGISTRATION SUSPENDED: A pharmacist who worked across Newcastle and Lake Macquarie has had her registration suspended for six months. Picture: File

A PHARMACIST has had her registration suspended for six months after the NSW Civil and Administrative Tribunal found she stole 'thousands' of tablets of Schedule 8 drugs from her employer, doctored invoices and skewed drug registers over a period of four years for her own use.

Caroline Jane Bradley was awarded a Master of Pharmacy from the University of Newcastle in 2011, and went on to work as an intern pharmacist at Glendale, a locum pharmacist at Cessnock and later worked at Lake Munmorah and Cardiff.

Bradley has had conditions placed on her registration since April 2018, banned from working as a pharmacist in charge and from handling any Schedule 8 medications.

She admitted "there was an awful lot" of tablets, potentially thousands, she misappropriated from a chemist in Glendale between 2013 to 2016.

A year later, she fraudulently adjuisted invoices and the register of stock on-hand on no less than 22 occasions to hide the 2,169 tablets she stole at her new job at Lake Munmorah.

She also admitted to asking a pharmacist in Cardiff to give her Endone for her husband without a prescription when she knew it was for herself, putting returned or out-of-date medication near the safe without making entries into the drug register and skewing the number of drugs received from a wholesaler.

On one occasion, Bradley signed off on 600 tablets of ADHD medication and said 500 had been received.

On another, she was given 168 tablets used to relieve severe pain, often by people with cancer, and only entered 112 into the system.

The tribunal found Bradley had also provided false information on a number of occasions to the Pharmaceutical Regulatory Unit (PRU) in 2018, saying the reason she had asked for Endone for her husband was because she had left his on an airplane.

She also claimed she didn't know who was making negative stock adjustments at Lake Munmorah and argued it could have been someone else trying to steal the medication to sell on the street.

Bradley initially denied stealing medications or making false entries in the drug register at Lake Munmorah and Cardiff - and told the PRU she only took oxycodone sporadically.

The NSW Civil and Administrative Tribunal found in its May decision that she was guilty of three complaints of unsatisfactory professional conduct and one of professional misconduct.

It found she suffers from a mental impairment, including anxiety and depression, and an opioid use disorder that is in remission.

"In our view, each individual particular represents a very serious departure from the standards expected of a registered pharmacist of equivalent training and experience," according to the tribunal's findings.

The Health Care Complaint Commission said Bradley had reflected on her conduct and shown remorse and a desire to clear her conscience, and that unless she had confessed to it, the extent of her misconduct likely wouldn't have come to light.

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