- April 13, 2026
Dear Editor:
I thought I had heard everything when I read about a 29-year-old woman who completed nursing school and got a job at the AdventHealth Hospital in Palm Coast without having passed her nursing exam.
She used another woman’s nursing license, without her knowledge, to prove she had passed the exam to be a nurse. She had the same first name as the other nurse, which was Autumn, but not the same last name. She told the hospital her last name on her license was different because she had gotten married.
Shockingly, AdventHealth Palm Coast never did ask for her marriage license to verify the last name on her nursing license and Autumn posed as a nurse there, overseeing approximately 4,486 patients over a seven-month period.
The charge Autumn could have faced for unlicensed practice of health care carries a minimum mandatory sentence of one-year incarceration and a $1,000 fine.
Let’s see what actually happened to her, according to the Daytona Beach News Journal. Autumn Bardisa was sentenced to 60 months of probation which can be terminated after 30 months. She can never work in the medical field again in “Florida."
From what I read, the judge did her best to coddle her, complimenting her at times and chastising the woman whose license was stolen by this imposter. Autumn Bardisa’s attorney blamed the jealous nurses in the hospital for checking up on her license when she was selected for a promotion.
Being a registered nurse myself, I doubt the other nurses chose to check her license because they were jealous she was getting a promotion. That makes no sense. And thank God, for whatever reason, they checked her license!
The victim whose license was stolen chose to talk to Autumn directly during the hearing saying, “Why would you put countless lives on the line” saying it was appalling and scary to her.
The judge asked her to stop with the personal attacks, saying “There is absolutely zero evidence that countless lives were on the line. Zero evidence. As a matter of fact the information that has been presented is that she was excellent in her job and she excelled at her job.”
The words of this judge should shock us all to the core, complimenting Autumn Bardisa for actions that warranted her being a felon.
Darla Widnall
Ormond Beach
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