Nurses in UK tied Sikh patient’s beard with gloves, kept him hungry: Report

London, Oct 2: Nurses allegedly tied a Sikh patient’s beard with plastic gloves, left him in his own urine and offered him food he couldn’t eat for religious reasons, a senior whistleblower from UK’s top nursing watchdog has claimed.
In a dossier leaked to The Independent from the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC), it was said that these nurses were allowed to carry on working despite the Sikh man complaining about discrimination in a note on his deathbed.
The damning report stated that the nursing regulator has failed to address “institutional racism” in its ranks for 15 years, which has allowed NMC staff “to go unchecked” when “applying guidance inconsistently based on their own discriminatory views”.
The Sikh patient’s family found his turban on the floor, out of his reach, and his beard tied up with rubber gloves, The Independent reported, adding that his case, which was initially closed by the NMC’s screening team, is now being re-assessed.
The NMC staff members responsible for deciding whether to pursue an investigation failed to properly consider responses to the note, left by the patient and discovered by his family after his death, a source told the publication.
The note, written in Punjabi, claimed nurses had laughed at him, kept him hungry by only offering food which they knew he couldn’t eat and did not respond to his call bell, causing him to wet himself and fall in his own urine.
“The staff are scared to report their concerns to the nursing regulator because of a ‘culture of fear’ within the watchdog,” documents seen by the publication said. (IANS)