Nurse Loses License After Stealing Fentanyl Meant For Patients To Satisfy Addiction

A nurse in Iowa has been sentenced to five years of probation and ordered to forfeit her nursing license after she admitted to stealing fentanyl meant for surgical patients and using the highly-potent drug to satisfy her addiction, federal officials said.

In a Monday news release, prosecutors said 52-year-old Sabrina Thalblum “diverted fentanyl to her own use” at her former employer, First Choice Surgery Center, where she worked from October 2017 to August 2019.

Officials said Thalblum pleaded guilty on July 21, 2021, to multiple charges, including one count of adulteration and misbranding with intent to defraud and mislead. The news release further noted that Thalblum “abused her position as a registered nurse to gain access to fentanyl.” She tampered with vials of fentanyl and replaced the drug with saline to “make it appear as if the vials were undisturbed.”

Aside from her five-year probation sentence and loss of license, Thalblum was also fined $10,000.

Thalblum admitted during her guilty plea that she was addicted to fentanyl from August 2018 to August 2019, KCRG reported.

The Gazette reported that Thalblum, the wife of a rabbi, had a severe history of substance abuse when she was younger, adding that she was diagnosed with depression and anxiety.

During Thalblum’s sentencing, U.S. District Judge C.J. Williams said that there was no evidence of patients at the local surgery center being injured or going out of medication due to Thalblum’s crime, the outlet reported. Thalblum reportedly said during the hearing that she felt “deep shame and regret” for what she did. She also reportedly apologized to her former colleagues, the community, and to her husband, Rabbi Todd Thalblum, who was the senior Rabbi at Temple Judah in Cedar Rapids.

According to the U.S. National Institute on Drug Abuse, fentanyl effects include “respiratory depression and arrest, unconsciousness, coma, and death.”

The agency said that while fentanyl is similar to morphine, “it is 50 to 100 times more potent,” noting that the synthetic opioid analgesic is among synthetic opioids most commonly “involved in overdose deaths.”

Earlier this month, the U.S. Customs and Border Protection reported an increase of 1,066% in the amount of fentanyl seized in south Texas during the fiscal year 2021. There have been reports of people purchasing other drugs without knowing that the drugs have been laced with fentanyl.

The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration said that mixing fentanyl with other drugs increases “the likelihood of a fatal interaction,” and added that “two milligrams of fentanyl can be lethal” depending on an individual’s history of drug use, size, and tolerance to the highly-potent drug.