A nurse could be struck off after going undercover at a hospital to expose shocking conditions for a TV documentary.

Nomalizwe Ndebele, 34, from Greenford, wore a secret camera for a Channel 4 Dispatches expose while working as a health care assistant at Ealing Hospital from September to December 2004.

The programme Undercover Angels apparently showed a nurse force feeding a patient, faeces being left on the floor of a toilet for three hours and food being left to go cold by a patient's bedside.

At one point in the film, Ms Ndebele is told by a qualified nurse to administer a patient's medication when she was not legally allowed to do so as a healthcare assistant.

Ms Ndebele denies charges from the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) of failing to protect the interests and dignity of her patients, by making the film and by not reporting her concerns to management.

It is also alleged she failed to co-operate fully with an investigation at the hospital following the broadcast of the programme on January 31, 2005.

John Hepworth, presenting the case for the NMC, said: "In the council's submission, one of the important issues in this case is the question of to whom does the nurse owe his or her primary responsibility.

"Is it to the patients she is caring for at any one time, or patients who in the future may be admitted to the relevant hospital?

"In the council's submission, the perceived interests of future patients can never overrule a nurse's duty to act in the interests of the current patients, and a nurse is bound by professional duty at all times."

"The very act of filming a patient without consent is a serious matter in itself, irrespective of whether no further dissemination takes place."

The hearing is expected to last until Friday.