A nurse who worked at the Royal Bolton Hospital has been struck off after "acting with misconduct".

After multiple hearings before Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) Fitness to Practise Committee, Nimrah Riaz has received a striking off order.

A striking-off order is the most serious sanction the NMC can issue. It means Ms Riaz’s name is removed from the register, which prevents her from working as a registered nurse, midwife or nursing associate.

Ms Riaz, who was not present nor represented in her absence at the hearing, was faced with 13 charges in total. 

All of them were proven except two specific dates referred to within two separate charges.

The committee found that she knowingly called in sick and received sick pay for shifts at Royal Bolton, while at the same time picking up shifts at Lancashire Foundation Trust and being paid for those.

It was also proved that Ms Riaz visited a patient at domestic abuse charity Fortalice without justification, wearing her name badge and fooling staff into thinking she was there in an official capacity.

The evidence given at the hearings additionally proved that she accessed the patient’s Partnership Working Log on one of the days she visited her at Fortalice.

The charity, however, denies that any of their records were accessed.

The report also says that in striking Ms Riaz’s name from its register for her misconduct the panel wanted to send the public and the profession a “clear message about the standards of behaviour required of a registered nurse”.

It added: “Nurses occupy a position of privilege and trust in society and are expected at all times to be professional and to maintain professional boundaries.

“Patients and their families must be able to trust nurses with their lives and the lives of their loved ones.

“To justify that trust, nurses must be honest and open and act with integrity.

"They must make sure that their conduct at all times justifies both their patients’ and the public’s trust in the profession.”

It added: “The panel bore in mind that the overarching objectives of the NMC - to protect, promote and maintain the health, safety, and wellbeing of the public and patients, and to uphold and protect the wider public interest.

“This includes promoting and maintaining public confidence in the nursing and midwifery professions and upholding the proper professional standards for members of those professions.”

The panel concluded that public confidence in the profession would be undermined if a finding of impairment were not made in this case.

It therefore found Miss Riaz’s fitness to practise impaired “on the grounds of public interest only".

James Mawrey, director of people and deputy chief executive at Bolton NHS Foundation Trust, said: “We do not comment on individual employment cases, however we can assure the public that we set very high professional standards for all of our staff.”

Fortalice declined to comment about the case.