A HOSPITAL nurse has been struck off after it was revealed that he lied about having a conviction for a sexual assault.

Arthur Poma, born in the Philippines, became a registered nurse in Oxfordshire in 2003 and went on to work at the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford.

He was convicted of committing a sexual assault offence in the third degree in 1998 in the state of Hawaii, in the USA, but failed to disclose his conviction upon joining NHS Professionals.

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When he joined the national healthcare organisation, Poma signed a declaration form that stated he had no previous convictions, but this was untrue.

After the healthcare services were made aware of the conviction in June 2018, Poma was immediately suspended from working at the John Radcliffe.

In January this year, the Nursing and Midwifery Council met to discuss Poma’s ‘fitness to practice’.

The council said that his signing the contract that said he had no previous convictions meant he was ‘dishonest’ and ‘intended to conceal the existence of [his] conviction from NHS Professionals to obtain paid work’.

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The council also said that, by not disclosing the conviction, Poma exposed NHS Professionals to the risk of reputational harm and his actions prevented the NHS from making ‘proper inquiries’ about his ‘safety to practice’.

The council decided that Poma’s fitness to practice nursing was impaired, and he needed to be struck off the nurse registry.

During the cross-examination, Poma said he did not disclose his conviction because he ‘thought it was already a spent conviction’.

He added: “If I was dishonest, then please allow me to take this opportunity to say I’m very sorry and that It would not happen again in the future.

“I paid the heavy price of losing my job and got my family in financial hardship, and no one to blame but me.”

Charges of sexual assault in the third degree, at the time of Poma’s conviction, included rape, knowingly having sexual contact with a person under the age of 14, or knowingly having sexual contact with another person is ‘mentally defective, mentally incapacitated, or physically helpless’.

However it is not known what offence Poma actually committed within this section of sexual assault crimes.

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Poma was given a probation period of five years following his conviction.

He still remains a registered sex offender in the US.

Sam Foster, Chief Nursing Officer at Oxford University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, said: “We alerted NHS Professionals as soon as we were made aware of this person’s conviction via the police.

“The individual was immediately suspended and prevented from working in any capacity in the trust and has not done so since his suspension.

“ As a trust, we follow national guidelines for pre-employment checks of all staff and this extends as a requirement to all third party providers of staff as their responsibility.”

A spokesperson from NHS Professionals said: “As soon as we were notified of the individual’s previous conviction by the trust, we immediately suspended him and referred him to the NMC in accordance with our policy.

“Patient safety is of the utmost importance to NHS Professionals and we operate robust and responsive clinical governance and compliance procedures.”