Harlow Partridge Care Home: Suspended former boss' nursing ban to end

The former manager of a care home found to have made a string of errors in relation to patients will be allowed to return to nursing next month.

Barrie Taylor had been manager at the Partridge Care Home in Harlow.

But he was suspended following an investigation by the BBC into care concerns at the home in 2010 and 2011.

The Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) said his six-month suspension would be left to lapse, saying he had undertaken leadership training.

Mr Taylor, a former captain in the Army Medical Corps, was found to have failed to ensure adequate staff training, failed to take appropriate action over a medication error and an alleged inappropriate use of restraint.

He was also found to have "punched a door" in response to a resident's behaviour.

Thomas Henderson, for Mr Taylor, told an NMC conduct and competence committee, external his client acknowledged he was someone "at risk of snapping in stressful situations" and "had identified concrete steps to manage this".

Mr Henderson said Mr Taylor had been "under a high degree of stress at the time of the incidents and (had) lacked the support of senior management".

Committee chairman Mary Thomas said it was clear Mr Taylor now had "a full appreciation" of how he "placed service users at risk and brought the profession into disrepute".

When the Care Quality Commission visited the home, run by Rushcliffe Care, last July, inspectors found information was not always securely stored and appropriate records maintained.

Rushcliffe Care is yet to comment on the case.