Nurses and other healthcare staff smoking alongside patients!?!

[SweetPEI]

I Just have a rant...

I am sick and tired of having to be bombarded with the scent of smoke in the psychiatric facility I currently work at. Where used to work, granted it was a med-psych unit and not an entire facility, no smoking was allowed... period. Not by the patients and definitely not by the staff. In fact, if staff member did smoke, they had to walk to a designated unsheltered area that was about 200 feet away from the building. Patients got the patch, but nothing more.

Now I work in a behavioral health hospital and which treats children all the way to the geriatric population. Everyone besides those on the child/adolescent units are allowed to smoke. We don't have designated smoking times and it is really up to staff deiscretion how often and when they let patients smoke in the designated patio areas. My issue is that I am subjected to the smell all the time and on one unit there is a backdraft that they say they are working on and I literally feel like I'm smoking.

My charge nurse got upset with me one day because we had a patient with severe muscular dystrophy who would have had a hard time holding her cigarette on her own. The charge asked me to sit out on the patio with her and assist because she feared this patient would burn herself. I respectfully refused. She was surprised, especially because I am usually very helpful. I simply told her that it was not part of my job description to cause harm to my lungs, especially considering I have asthma, just because a patient needed to smoke. I don't understand why this patient could not have had a doctors order for a nicotine patch when smoking was not something she could do without the assistance of staff. She couldn't argue with me and she didn't.

Then the other problem is that at least 60-70% of all the nurses in the facility smoke. This does NOT include other healthcare staff. I think this is ridiculous. Don't get me wrong, there are many bad vices we all have that really shouldn't be since we are in the business of health promotion, but to me smoking really stands out because it affects everyone around you. It is quite unfair that I have to be prepared to use my pump at work because of the smoking. My asthma is usually not that bad and it only really affects me during spring time. I am in the process of filing a complaint because at the end of the day as I see it, If i do get an asthma attack related to the smoking that is an on the job injury...

That's my rant...

[SweetPEI]

I'll do that when you actually stop stating you want to change people. You can't have your cake and eat it to. My post was based on the following and other comments you have made.

Sounds like requesting change to me. If you don't like it quit. If you want to stay for the experience stay for the whole experience and use it to open your mind. I think your attitude towards smokers closes you off to your smoking patient's somewhat. I personal am revulted by smoke and am lucky that I live in a city where smoking is uncommon but I would never express my revulsion to a smoker because it doesn't help them one little bit. I check my personal viewpoint at the door as a nurse. It's vital.

Let us not start making things up. You didn't read any post by me regarding saying anything to a smoker. That is why I posted on AN, to vent about a situation. You did read that I encourage patients who do complain about it to file a grievance with the patient advocate and non smoking coworkers have talked with me about the issue. I have never been confrontational with staff.

[BuckyBadgerRN, ASN, RN]

No way would I have held that cigarette either.....

[R.N.Sandra]

How in the world are we promoting sustaining a greater health status for our patients if we are allowing them to harm themselves? Secondly, in regard to the patient you were asked to assist with smoking??????? Really? I dont know if I am correct but I mean what if one day that patient gets cancer or the other million things that can happen from smoking and blames you the nurse who helped her smoke because she was so physically ill that she could not hold her own cigerette.

File that complaint, you should never be asked to harm a patient. What happened to do no harm? Is that not part of our oath.

[R.N.Sandra]

I suggest you find another job.

I understand your dislike the smoking but you are employed were it is allowed.

Honestly, you come on a bit on about the rabid side of it. Sticking a patch on it doesn't fix it. The only fix is the person wants to quit.

In some ways it is cruel to deprieve someone of smoking when it is still within their rights.

Smoking is a horrid habit and it would be a wonderful world if it didn't exist.

Unfortunately it does.

I smoked for near 27 years and have been a non-smoker coming up on three years now.

It was one of the hardest things I have ever done.

As healthcare professionals we deprive patients of those things that harm their health. For instance, if an obese patient comes into the hospital we put them on a proper diet, we dont give them junk food and 6000 calories because it is our job to protect their health. Not to mention that it is our oath to not do harm to any patient, ever. Not to mention the legal liability that exists when someone gets lung cancer and their defense is that this "nurse" helped me smoke or allowed it or what not. At our facility, we had one patient that came and wanted to smoke and administration said that the nurses were to escort her out to smoke every such and such hour. Including the staff that smoked, we all refused to do so and that was the end of that. Hello, we are supposed to be making people better not helping them harm themselves.

[R.N.Sandra]

Considering I began my post with the word "rant" um, that is exactly what I did... Rant!! That is what allnurses is about. Furthermore, I have the right to complain and I also have the right to be able to breathe. I also have the right to refuse to sit with someone and hold their cigarette while they smoke. I also have the right when I sit at the nurses station, which is never near any smoking patio to not smell smoke, except, of course, majority of my co-workers smoke. that is my rant.

You are absolutely correct, we are here to promote health and well being. I would refuse to hold someone cigerette while they smoked as well.

[R.N.Sandra]

How in the world is this nurse putting her needs before the patients? Smoking causes horrid health problems, if anything she is advocating for her patients health. Its legal to drink alcohol, so why dont we just let the alcoholics have bottles of vodka? Same exact scenerio. Just because its legal, and its a right does not mean that we do it because it is not in the patients best interest?

[R.N.Sandra]

You need to advocate for your patients wants and needs, so if it includes smoking, you should consider encouraging that activity while providing educational information that smoking can be adverse for your health if you continue to do it.

So, do we advocate for an alcoholic to be able to get drunk? Its legal, its their right, whats the difference?

[SweetPEI]

Man oh man where were y'all when I was being thrown in the trenches? Lol. Luckily, I didn't back down or change my tune

[cav5]

ok, i believe that nurses shouldn't be helping people smoke.

i also believe we should do no harm-this is where the path gets a little murky for me.

this is an acute psychiatric facility and priorities have to be assessed- quitting smoking is waaaay down on that list-that is likely why "facility" smoking has been allowed in this day and age. if smoking has been used as a crutch to get over a more serious, acute illness then it isn't optimal but i can see the merits in it.

i would agree that it would be a nice world where every work place would be smoke free. i would also agree that employees can do whatever they want to their bodies while on a break no matter how it makes them smell when they walk back into the nurses’ station.

finally, i firmly believe that your facility is not going to change its ways because of an employee’s needs-call me cynical but that is the way i see it. they might for the patient and i suspect you know that because you have already sent them down to complain about it.

on one hand you say you haven't shown judgment at the workplace while simultaneously saying that many people have come to you to complain. that might be because they complain to everybody or it might be because you are very open to the complaint and many people know it. i really hope it is the former one but suspect it might be a little of the latter.

i know it is a rant and believe everyone has the right to come here and do that. i also believe that people have a right to respond to that rant however they choose. the only thing that you can control is what you take from all of it (good and bad).

for your own sake i would find another job-experience isn't worth the respiratory problems you are having.

[Ruas61, BSN, RN]

As healthcare professionals we deprive patients of those things that harm their health. For instance, if an obese patient comes into the hospital we put them on a proper diet, we dont give them junk food and 6000 calories because it is our job to protect their health. Not to mention that it is our oath to not do harm to any patient, ever. Not to mention the legal liability that exists when someone gets lung cancer and their defense is that this "nurse" helped me smoke or allowed it or what not. At our facility, we had one patient that came and wanted to smoke and administration said that the nurses were to escort her out to smoke every such and such hour. Including the staff that smoked, we all refused to do so and that was the end of that. Hello, we are supposed to be making people better not helping them harm themselves.

I am glad you are not my coworker or any part of my health care world.

People are people with short-comings. We help by educatio, supporting, directing not steamrolling.

Get over it.

We as nurses aren't the ultimate high power.

[FLboundBSN]

I am glad you are not my coworker or any part of my health care world.

People are people with short-comings. We help by educatio, supporting, directing not steamrolling.

Get over it.

We as nurses aren't the ultimate high power.

with a reply like that, why even reply?? seriously???

Being a former smoker of 3 years now, I agree that in a workplace, we shouldnt have to deal with smokers, let alone being out in the general public. Holding a cigarette for a patient is not part of a nurses job description and I am glad you stood up for yourself by respectfully declining. I would have done the same.

[DolceVita, ADN, BSN, RN]

There is something wrong about a nurse being asked to hold someone's cig so they can smoke. I do not believe smoking is a right - even when I smoked. I feel sorry for those who still smoke because quitting was THE HARDEST thing I have done in my life. By the way...I haven't had a drink for 17 years which was a bloody cake walk by comparison.

Now that I realize how much I reeked of cigarettes I don't think we should be allowed to smoke in our work clothes. But i wont sign on for that unless providers have to do the same. Sorry, it is foul and nasty. I told myself the lie for years that it didn't reek.

All that being said....I would either learn some patience and tolerance at a deep level about the stuff at this place or find a new job. While you are still there keep a good attitude and work with what you have. Down the road they probably will change their policy. If you have behaved like an awesome employee - you might be welcomed back.

So concentrate on being the best nurse and employee you can. That doesn't mean you need to help a patient smoke. It just means be professional not self-righteous when you RESPECTFULLY decline.

Dolce Vita