A NURSE who locked a dementia patient in his room has been sacked from her job and suspended from nursing.

Elaine Hastings was working in Ward Two at Woodland View in Irvine between August and September, 2016, when she locked the patient’s door, holding it closed locking him inside while an unnamed colleague shouted and swore at the man through the window.

The elderly man was suffering from Lewy Bodies dementia, meaning he was prone to fainting, falling and hallucinations and should never have been locked in or left alone.

A hearing of the Nursing and Midwifery Council also found that on the evening of September 14, 2016 Hastings put a linen basket in front of the same man’s door, failed to give one-to-one supervision and did not keep an accurate record of his behaviour.

Hastings told the panel she locked the vulnerable patient inside his room because she was ‘scared’, saying: “I know I shouldn’t have done what I did and know we were meant to keep him safe but I was scared/frightened.

“I was thinking of myself and keeping myself safe before keeping him safe.”

The panel heard evidence from six witnesses, one of whom said Hastings had “pulled the door shut, locked it with a key” stopping the patient from leaving. The witness said the patient was “agitated and trying to open the door as the door handle was moving.

She said that she could also hear him bumping his zimmer frame against the room door. “

The witness said she had challenged Mrs Hasting and told her that she could not lock the door.

She said Mrs Hastings had replied: “Yes, I can. I have done it before.”

Hastings was sacked from her post after a disciplinary hearing on December 14, 2016 and referred to the NMC which, last week hit her with a 12-month suspension from nursing.