A Florida woman who spent months treating hospital patients while pretending to be a nurse will stay out of prison—but nowhere near a medical job, Fox News reports. Flagler County authorities say 29-year-old Autumn Bardisa of Palm Coast treated more than 4,400 patients at AdventHealth between June 2024 and January 2025 while posing as a licensed nurse. Investigators say she never held a valid nursing license and instead plugged in the license number of another nurse who shared her first name, then allegedly falsified records to get hired and later promoted as an advanced nurse technician.
Bardisa pleaded no contest this week to unlicensed practice of health care and fraudulent use of identification. Under a plea deal, Circuit Judge Dawn Nichols withheld adjudication and sentenced her to five years' probation and 50 hours of community service. She must write an apology letter to the nurse whose license number she used, give up a nursing license she obtained after her arrest, and is banned from working in the medical field during her probation. The nurse whose license she used attended school with Bardisa, and was also employed by AdventHealth, NBC Miami reports. She spoke out for the first time during Bardisa's sentencing hearing, saying she had "a million 'whys' floating around" in her mind about the case, WESH reports.
The case began to unravel when a coworker checked her credentials and found only an expired certified nursing assistant license, prompting a broader probe by state and federal health agencies. Flagler County Sheriff Rick Staly said Bardisa's conduct "potentially endangered patients" and "ruined her career," calling it one of the most significant medical fraud cases his agency has handled. Officials are urging anyone who believes Bardisa may have treated them to contact the sheriff's office. During the sentencing hearing, Bardisa described her actions as a simple case of someone "not crossing their I's, dotting their T's, making sure everything was complete."
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