Obese nurse has job reinstated after ‘harsh, unjust and unreasonable’ termination

A nurse fired because she was so obese she could not complete all her duties has had her job reinstated and will be paid for the almost three years she has been without a job.

The nurse, Heike Geselle, lost her job at Adelaide’s Lyell McEwin Hospital in November 2018 and will be re-employed within a different area of the hospital after winning her case in the South Australian Employment Tribunal.

Magistrate Stephen Lieschke said the dismissal was “harsh, unjust and unreasonable”.

Northern Adelaide Local Health Network interim chief executive Debbie Chin terminated Ms Geselle’s employment after deciding she was unable to complete duties “inherent to your role due to a non-work related medical condition”.

The registered nurse was told in 2017 that she had to stand when performing nursing duties, but kept sitting on certain occasions when treating patients.

She had worked at the hospital since 1993 and weighed 165 kilograms when she was terminated.

Through her union, Ms Geselle offered to either take on alternative duties or take leave while she sought lap band surgery, but this was rejected.

Nurse could go back to modified work

Mr Lieschke found there was “no medical evidence that supported Ms Chin’s conclusion that the applicant was unlikely to regain sufficient functional capacity to be fit for at least a reasonably and safely modified lighter nursing role”.

“While it remains a possibility that the applicant may not recover from the health setbacks caused by her suspension and dismissal, and improve her pre-suspension functional work capacity, such that she will not regain fitness for a suitably modified lighter nursing role, that conclusion cannot be reached at this point in time,” Mr Lieschke wrote.

He also rejected the health service’s push for Ms Geselle not to receive back pay for the time since she was terminated since it did not do a “proper search” for a new position for her.

It could also not be proven that her health conditions were not related to her work.

“That assertion was no more than a self-serving declaration, which avoided the respondent having to consider the applicant’s potential additional rights under the Return to Work Act,” the magistrate decided.

Ms Geselle has lost more than 30kg since her dismissal.