Smoking outside hospitals. Can l contact someone?

[Moier]

This Morning.. talking about smoking in public places.. especially hospitals.
This week l was waiting at the entrance of my local hospital waiting for a pick up after having a procedure.
Despite all the notices about not smoking in the area l literally counted 23 people and 9 were patients in wheelchairs...some with drips.. and three in NHS uniforms.
The smell was horrible.
I now think the time has come for enforcement or action.
Security were about .. but no one saying anything.
3 Yards away is a smoking shelter but that was empty.
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I could not walk past them.
I am horrifically disabled after being thrown under a bus and left for dead ( my ex got jailed for attempted murder). Maybe think about the rest of us patients.
I was pushed in a wheel chair and left with the rest of them.
Until my pick up came and helped me.
So wasn't just a few minutes wait was 35 minutes breathing in the smoke.

I agree with you OP. The staff definitely should be told, I expect people initially started asking people to move to the shelter but got grief for it and stopped.

You also have to wade in through to get into the hospitals. None of the ones i go to stop it. It makes me cringe especially when its heavily pregnant women puffing away. Nothing you can do about it

You can assume that people going into and leaving the hospital are having a bad time and that they shouldn’t have to walk through smoke. Why should selfish smokers get put first when they can’t be bothered to go to the smoking area?

I used to politely direct people to the smoking area on my way into work but then got a load of abuse so won’t put myself through that. It’s so appalling that people are that unaware of the impact of them smoking. Tricky thing is mh issues and situations of loss of a loved one, people are emotional.

Can you find out who the CEO of the hospital is and write to them?

That’s vile. Maybe try emailing the hospital and suggest some and to tackle it?
I liked one state we went to in the USA where smoking is banned something like 20feet from buildings so you can’t just smoke outside places like that. It becomes the norm after a while same as the indoor smoking ban has here. There is no gross bit you need to walk through to get into anywhere it works really well.

The majority of people I see smoking outside our local hospital are pregnant women
I'm sure I read something in the news yesterday that smoking on all hospital grounds is too be banned? Sooner the better!

Both of my local hospitals are non-smoking but still people just stand there with a fag. Quite a few times they’ve had an announcement on the comms that “this is a no smoking site” but still nothing is done about it. Absolutely grates on me!

I don't smoke but they will be going through a very stressful time, could have a dying relative, could have cancer, there's lots of things, I would not begrudge someone a cigarette in those circumstances.

Whst about the sick and stressed people who don't want to be exposed to the fag smoke? Don't they count?

You don't understand addiction, do you?

I completely agree OP. In my trust there is a big white line around the perimeter of the site and all smokers are meant to be outside that line. It’s visible from all the doors so not too far away. There are signs up everywhere that smoke makes the patients feel sick and please don’t impose your smoke on them. As a general rule outside my building there isn’t a huge issue but staff who have approached people sometimes get abused so it’s not something I risk. But managers do approach people successfully and get security back up if necessary. Staff tend to go across the road. I’d write to the Trust management - they can make a bit more of an effort to change the culture if they tried.

It’s a complicated one. The hospital I work in is officially smoke-free, but outside each entrance, there will be a cluster of people smoking. It’s always patients and visitors. You do see NHS staff smoking but they tend to go just off site.
I work on a respiratory ward and so see on a daily basis the awful effects that smoking can have on somebody’s life, including them dying from smoking-related diseases. But I also see many of these patients continuing to smoke, despite knowing what it is doing to them, which highlights how hugely addictive it is.
For many (although not all), anyone who has reason to be on a hospital site, whether as patient or visitor is likely to be going through a stressful or unhappy experience. Although I don’t like it, my feeling is live and let live.

Is this pinderfields? Bloody terrible there They regularly have this announcement on loudspeaker saying. Do not smoke near the front doors yet. When you come out, it's like clouds of smoke. Particularly one time I had been diagnosed with lung clots on both lungs. I could hardly breathe when I got out and even worse. I was a patien another time In a side room and every day I could smell the smoke. Come in through the open window

I work at a hospital It's awful there too. Outside the main entrance but also I regularly walk past the maternity department entrance where pregnant women are smoking. Can't help but be a bit judgy there.

Mostly it's patients tbh as if staff are caught then they get sanctioned. There is a specific smoking area well away from the public areas for staff.

I'd complain to PALS for what it's worth.

In our trust, staff smoking anywhere on the premises know they risk disciplinary action for failing to follow a reasonable management instruction (obeying the sign).

As for the patients, I don't risk an argument but I cough and move away if I can. I hate it.

Smoking is banned on NHS property apart from designated shelters/places, including outdoors, in Scotland.
At my local hospital the staff and security are for ever moving people on and away from the door - and the reason given is always 'others do not need to inhale your smoke'.

All hospital sites should be smokefree. It was the same at ours, smokers standing outside the doors to the maternity unit. Walk the bloody 100 yards to the designated smoking area, lazy feckers. Don't inflict your dirty smoke on others. Smokers are so selfish.

Surely the sick and stressed aren't just hanging around the outside of the doors?

The smoking shelters need to be bigger if there were 23 people and wheelchairs. Even smokers don't like smelling of smoke and being in a confined space, especially the staff who then suck mints and douse themselves in body spray which is even worse.

They should be in the shelter. If I'm going through those doors it's usually because my lungs aren't working very well. But then when I worked in a and e on reception the paramedics used to smoke right outside our window

Three yards further to the smoking shelter, presumably?!

You must have more to worry about than fag smoke then tbh

I loathe smoking and when you have to walk through clouds of cigarette smoke to take your young child home after an asthma attack that led to her being in hospital overnight on oxygen you do inwardly curse a bit.
There are usually smoking areas they can use that are pretty close to the exit/entrance but some people can't even get that far. Its sad and they must be seriously addicted to make that much effort to smoke