The Flagler County Sheriff’s Office has arrested 29-year-old Autumn Bardisa for allegedly working as a nurse at AdventHealth Palm Coast without the requisite credentials to be doing so. She worked for Flagler County’s largest healthcare provider for a year and a half before being fired. The case was investigated by the FCSO along with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
Bardisa is accused of having listed herself as a registered nurse while applying for the job, despite this not being true. During the time in which AdventHealth employed her, she is reported to have seen 4,486 patients per an investigation by the Flagler County Sheriff’s Office. The FCSO is asking those who may have been fraudulently cared for by Bardisa to email fakenursecase@flaglersheriff.com.
Her first day having come on July 3rd, 2023, Bardisa worked at AdventHealth until January 22nd, 2025. Her employment came under question when one of her superiors realized she might have falsified her credentials. Further complicating the ruse was that Bardisa is alleged to have forged a nursing license under the name Autumn ‘Ruba’ Hood. She was said to have explained the discrepancy as being caused by her changing her name after being married, but she never provided a marriage license to validate this claim.
Some of the fault may ultimately land with AdventHealth for the debacle. The FCSO detective who investigated the case said that the company ‘failed to immediately identify’ a discrepancy in the name on Bardisa’s license and her actual name. It was called an ‘oversight’ on her employer’s part when she was awarded the job title of registered nurse in June 2024.
Even more alarming, red flags appeared to only arise once Bardisa was about to be promoted. She was offered the title of charge nurse this past January, prompting one of her co-workers to look into her license status. This revealed that her certified nursing assistant license (the only one she’d obtained) had been expired for around eight months. At this point, far into the alleged fraudulent nursing activities, AdventHealth began an inquiry into Bardisa.
Bardisa was arrested on Tuesday, charged with seven counts each of unlicensed practice of a health care professional and fraudulent identification. Her bond was set at $70,000, and as of Wednesday she is still listed as being in custody at the county jail. Further charges may be pending.
“This is one of the most disturbing cases of medical fraud we’ve ever investigated,” said Sheriff Rick Staly. “This woman potentially put thousands of lives at risk by pretending to be someone she was not and violating the trust of patients, their families, AdventHealth and an entire medical community. Thanks to great investigative work between our detectives and State Attorney R.J. Larizza’s Office and AdventHealth, along with our state and federal partners, she’ll now be held accountable for her reckless and dangerous actions.”
