No review for nurse who did not try to revive '˜dead' woman after backlash

Despite the pensioner not breathing and being ‘yellow, waxy, and almost cold’, with no signs of life – including a pulse – the watchdog said Jane Frances Kendall should have also called 999.

The decision to give Ms Kendall, from the Moorland Nursing Home in Poulton, a caution order lasting 24 months was met with ‘concern and considerable debate’, the British Medical Association (BMA), Resusitation Council, and Royal College of Nursing (RCN) said in a joint statement.

The NMC said in a statement at the RCN’s Congress in Liverpool that it is ‘supportive’ of the guidance, which clarified: “An intial presumption in favour of CPR does not mean indiscriminate application of CPR that is of no benefit and not in a person’s best interests.”

But writing on Twitter, the NMC said: “We will not be reviewing individual cases. We recognise that for a nurse or midwife, CPR decision can be very complex.

“All cases are fact specific. We are working with others, including the RCN, on this important area.”

Dr Gordon Caldwell, wrote to the General Medical Council in March and said: “Over my career I have been distressed by taking part in and seeing many CPR procedures performed on patients in whom it should clearly not have been started.

“I have memories of brutal procedures being done on fragile bodies clearly at the end of long life, not dying of cardiac arrest.”

He added: “The General Medical Council must take action to protect the public from the incorrect use of CPR because, when used for the wrong diagnosis, it does not work [and] causes much more harm than benefit.”