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A "burnt out" Tyrone superintendent pharmacist who received a police caution over his failure to maintain the pharmacy's controlled drugs record and "recklessly" represented himself as responsible pharmacist after being temporarily removed from the register has had conditions placed on his practice. 

Denver Devlin, owner of Torrent Pharmacy in the village of Donaghmore, was told by the Pharmaceutical Society of Northern Ireland after a December 11-12 hearing that he must continue meeting with an appointed mentor and that he must keep a record of all private prescription and CD supplies and present these records to the PSNI at a future hearing. 

The hearing established that on January 23, 2025, Mr Devlin received a caution over nine offences involving the failure to maintain a register of the supply of controlled drugs such as Zoomorph tablets, Palexia tablets and MST tablets. 

This followed an unannounced inspection in September 2023 that revealed the pharmacy had failed to record "at least 86" supplies of private prescriptions and that the CD register was not present at the pharmacy. 

When the register was produced and missing entries identified, he attempted to backfill the entries retrospectively at his home. 

Despite these efforts, reconciliation with wholesaler receipts suggested the register was still missing information relating to the sale and supply of "a substantial number of controlled drugs" over a three-year period. 

"There was a routine and persistent failure to maintain core records over an extended period of time," the committee found. 

Mr Devlin cooperated with the Department of Health's Medicines Regulatory Group (MRG) in its investigations and admitted to a number of legal and professional failings," the fitness to practise committee found, also noting that he complied with interim conditions imposed in late 2023. 

He told the committee he was "burnt out" and had been overworked as the sole pharmacy contractor serving his "remote country location," causing considerable difficulties in keeping records and meeting deadlines as required.

These factors also led to him failing to pay his PSNI renewal fees, which led to him being removed from the register for a period of 23 days from August 10-23, 2023 after he remedied this. 

The regulator found that on dates in August 2023 he had logged in as responsible pharmacist and acted as superintendent despite his removal from the register meaning he could not do so nor provide any pharmaceutical services that require PSNI registration. 

This was "reckless" of Mr Devlin, said the committee, adding that while he has undertaken "some acts of remedation" he has not yet shown sufficient insight into his misconduct. 

However, the committee also judged that there was "no element of dishonesty" in his actions but rather that he had acted "recklessly".

The committee also took into account the impact a suspension would have on the provision of pharmacy services to the local community as Mr Devlin is the sole provider of these services. Mr Devlin told the committee that after struggling to recruit he now has assistance from locum staff two days a week.