A woman is suing the Nova Scotia Hospital for what she calls negligent behaviour after she was allegedly defrauded tens of thousands of dollars while she was a patient.

Dianne MacDonald says her stay at the hospital in Dartmouth cost her more than $54,000 and she wants the money back.

“If it wasn’t for my extended family I would be homeless,” says MacDonald, who has been in and out of hospitals because she has bipolar disorder. “It’s stressful and I’ve been where I’ve been suicidal and it’s a rough go.”

MacDonald was a patient at the hospital between March and April and that’s when she says she lost all of her money, to a fellow patient.

“He was a patient in the hospital and he played on my heart by telling me that he needed money for his kids,” says MacDonald.

She says the man visited her regularly after he was released. He asked her for money and even took her to the bank to get it.

MacDonald’s lawyer says she was susceptible to this kind of fraud and her family had made her doctors aware of that.

“Her condition had previously demonstrated problems with being too free with money, giving away money, and making close associations with people that she didn’t really know,” says her lawyer, Patrick Eagan.

After giving away $20,000, MacDonald says she told her doctor she thought there was a problem.

“She put me on a bus with a bunch of pills and sent me home for the weekend.”

MacDonald is now suing the doctor and the Nova Scotia Hospital for negligent behaviour.

“The strongest argument is that the hospital seems to have no controls over who comes and goes,” says Eagan.

Eagan says he tried to resolve the matter out of court, but the hospital didn’t respond. The hospital and MacDonald’s doctor haven’t filed a formal response to the claims.

“We don’t want a whole lot but for the return of what she lost,” says Eagan.

MacDonald says that $54,000 she lost was everything she had.

The Capital District Health Authority declined to comment on the matter, saying it can’t comment on a case before the courts.

With files from CTV Atlantic's Kayla Hounsell