PM40065782
Emplo
y
ment Law Today
Canad ad a ian
www.employmentlawtoday.com
June 20, 2018
Hospital dispenses dismissal
to sticky-fi ngered pharmacy technician
Technician claimed it was common for drug counts
to be inaccurate, but the only recorded discrepancies were hers
BY JEFFREY R. SMITH
A NEW BRUNSWICK arbitrator has up-
held the dismissal of a pharmacy technician
whose inaccurate recordkeeping showed
that she likely was stealing narcotics.
Shelley Arsenault was a pharmaceutical
technician hired in 2007 by the Doctor Ev-
erett Chalmers Hospital (DECH) in Freder-
icton, N.B. Since Arsenault was a technician
and not a pharmacist, she wasn't licensed
by any governing body or college of phar-
macists — instead, she was a graduate of a
diploma program that focussed on general
practices associated with the pharmacy
technician role, helping the pharmacist.
When Arsenault started at DECH, she was
trained over several weeks on the job. e
training included the standard procedure of
making a physical count of controlled drugs
in stock on a weekly basis.
On Nov. 14, 2016, two employees in the
DECH pharmacy expressed concern to the
pharmacy manager about a medication de-
Dangerous dishonesty
Lab technician's failure to follow procedures and attempts to thwart
investigation broke high standard of trust needed in managing blood supply
BY JEFFREY R. SMITH
AN ALBERTA arbitrator has upheld the
dismissal of a Canadian Blood Services
(CBS) technician for her disregard of proto-
cols and attempts to cover it up, fi nding the
worker couldn't be trusted to maintain the
high standards required for managing the
blood supply.
e worker was hired by CBS, the national
blood collection and processing organiza-
tion, in October 2003 to be a laboratory at-
tendant and team lead. e position includ-
ed assignments of end labelling, which is the
fi nal processing step before units of blood
are released back into inventory for trans-
portation to hospitals.
End labelling of units of red blood cells,
once they've been separated from other
components in blood, is set out in a standard
operating procedure document that is dis-
tributed to all staff , who are trained on it and
expected to know it. e procedure includes
the stipulation that a unit of red blood cells
cannot be kept out of refrigerated storage
The ironic taxi service pg. 3
Driver of accessible van can't take
wheelchairs due to medical restrictions;
discipline and dismissal for refusing
such assignments was discrimination
Temporary layoffs:
Understanding the right pg. 4
Knowing the rules and
importance of contractual
provision key to legal layoffs
FAILURE on page 6 »
NO RECORD
on page 7 »
CREDIT:
LISA
S./SHUTTERSTOCK
with Leah Schatz
Ask the Expert pg. 2
Short-term employee's
leave request
