Yesterday, Ormsby was censured, ordered to pay a $5000 fine and was ruled liable to pay half of the tribunal and Professional Conduct Committee’s (PCC) costs.
Her midwife registration was also suspended for 18 months, and she was ordered to notify any employer about the outcome of the tribunal proceedings.
Ormsby, who is based in Australia, will have further conditions imposed if she returns to practise in New Zealand.
The suspension will also apply in Australia, PCC lawyer Farzana Nizam said.
Ormsby appeared via audio-visual link earlier this week, refusing to turn her camera on, but did not return for the subsequent days of the hearing.
Nizam said Ormsby made more than 300 false claims over two years.
She told the tribunal the PCC did not believe Ormsby’s misconduct would have stopped if she had not been identified for audit.
The more than $166,000 Ormsby received from the Ministry of Health via payment claims was a “substantial amount”, Nizam said.
During a Health New Zealand Te Whatu Ora audit, Ormsby was asked if she could repay the falsely claimed money through different plans, such as weekly payments, but she never responded, Nizam said.
She said it had been seven years since the audit ended, so Ormsby was “unlikely” to begin paying the amount back voluntarily. The ministry would not actively try to collect the debt, Nizam said.
It was accepted by the prosecution that Ormsby had no disciplinary history in the profession.
Her lawyer, Neil Shaw, told the tribunal his client understood a suspension was likely and said it would negatively impact her.
He argued Ormsby had limited means to pay large fines.
Claiming and charges
Former Health NZ Te Whatu Ora lead investigator Kim Murray said auditors were alerted to the midwife’s activity after she had the highest number of claims in the country at the time.
The midwife had claimed “five times more than the second-highest-claiming midwife nationwide”, Murray earlier told the tribunal.
Midwives could claim pay from the ministry for services done as a lead maternity carer.
They could also claim for rural support and secondary midwife services.
Midwife Chris Stanbridge, who reviewed the accused’s clinical notes during the audit, said Ormsby either had no or insufficient documentation to prove she had carried out the procedures she had claimed payment for.
The accused was out of New Zealand at the time of some births she had claimed to have assisted with, Stanbridge said.
Six midwives who worked with Ormsby at practices in Waikato gave evidence at the hearing, repeatedly saying their notes showed no reason to warrant the midwife’s claims for rural support or secondary midwifery services.
“I do not know why the claim was made, those services were not provided,” one midwife repeated many times.
On several occasions, claims were made for births Ormsby was not present for or did not assist with.
The first charge against Ormsby was for not registering the mothers she claims to have serviced between 2017 and 2019, for which she was not paid.
However, she claimed and was paid thousands for maternity care that she did not provide, the PCC, appointed by the Midwifery Council of New Zealand, said in its charging document.
This included receiving $28,724.70 for 28 claims or 18 pregnancies and $101,963.89 for rural support care in 173 claims or 151 pregnancies.
She also claimed $8442.73 from the ministry for rural travel following birth, whereas the charges say she had “no basis for doing so”.
The total sum alleged to have been falsely claimed, and which Murray said Health NZ is seeking a repayment for, is $166,085.