A Florida nurse stole patients’ pain meds and gulped them herself, the state and cops say
A registered nurse admitted checking out drugs for hospital patients, then taking them herself, the Florida Department of Health and Brevard County Sheriff’s Office said.
Along with charges of controlled substance possession, grand theft and obtaining a controlled substance via fraud, Rockledge resident Tiffany Gallo also might lose the registered nurse license she’s had since February 2018. A June 25 emergency restriction order (ERO) prohibits her from working with access to controlled substances.
According to a affidavit for an arrest warrant and the ERO, Gallo used her access at Melbourne’s Viera Hospital to check out pain medication Dilaudid, down it and throw away the vial. She told BCSO investigators she got in this habit in November.
“Ms. Gallo confessed she was stealing the Dilaudid vials to appropriate for her own use because of a combination of stress and fatigue from work,” the arrest warrant affidavit said.
Though the affidavit mentioned suspicions about Gallo, the documents say a New Year’s Eve-New Year’s Day binge brought final scrutiny to Gallo.
On Jan. 1, a patient told the lead charge nurse that Gallo hadn’t given her any of the Dilaudid she was prescribed. The charge nurse checked the Pyxis drug dispensing system and found Gallo had checked out eight Dilaudid vials in 12 hours for this patient.
That sparked a quick investigation that found 26 Dilaudid vials suspected to be fraudulently pulled by Gallo on Dec. 31 and Jan. 1. A nursing manager told investigators that, in her opinion, “the amounts of Dilaudid Ms. Gallo claimed she was pulling to administer to her patients would have resulted in overdose and possible death of those patients.”
A hospital investigator told his BCSO counterparts that from Nov. 18 through Jan. 1, he found 135 occasions of Gallo pulling Dilaudid and not giving it to patients or throwing it away.
Gallo resigned from Viera Hospital on Jan. 3. She was arrested Feb. 11 and posted $9,000 bond the same day.
This story was originally published July 15, 2020 at 7:32 AM.
