A NURSE who began preparing a "dead" patient for the undertakers when she was sitting up in bed alive and well has been thrown out of the profession.

Maria Lelis, 46, wrote the wrong names on patient tags when she was at the Rochdale Infirmary.

When an unnamed elderly woman died of chest problems, the nurse jotted down the details of a living patient, the Nursing and Midwifery Council heard.

A colleague pointed out she had got the wrong person, and Lelis said: "Oh yes. I got mixed up."

The committee found that the "mistake" did not amount to misconduct, but they ruled that she should be struck off for making a series of other errors which did.

Swabbing

Those included carrying out a test for the killer bug MRSA - by swabbing the wrong part of a woman's body.

Lelis admitted making the error because she was "confused" and had never carried one out before.

She also put another patient on an oxygen because his nostrils were flared, although there was nothing wrong with his breathing.

The committee also heard how Lelis forgot to give a patient his medication - but then wrote up that she had the day after. She was caught out when she said she had given him a 150mg tablet, although they were only in 50mg doses.

Lelis was cleared of trying to offer a woman Paracetamol two hours after taking Co-Proxamol pills, which would have left the patient at risk of having a Paracetamol overdose.

The nurse, who is now living in Croydon, Surrey, admitted signing the medical records a day late, incorrectly swabbing the patient and getting the dead patient mixed up with the living patient.

Lelis had denied misconduct from October 10 to 30, 2003, while working for the Pennine Acute Hospitals NHS Trust.