Nurses Smoking

lol...There are many bad habits out there and peope making uneducated choices. Some of these however don't effect other people health like in second hand smoker. I think the focus of this tread here is nurses, a health professional, who knows better but still couldn't help to make the bad choice. There is no excuse for this. If they don't smoke, they will get very cranky. I haven't seen a doctor smokes, I wonder how come people don't talk about doctors who smoke!

Hmmm, well people that go over the speed limit could very well harm someone too, no?

Don't get me wrong, like I've said previously in this thread, I don't smoke and I hate the smell of cigarette smoke as it makes me cough like I'm hacking up a lung .... and after seeing my grandma die of lung cancer, I won't ever pick up that nasty habit. But until they make cigarettes illegal, then I don't think we should be calling nurses that smoke "irresponsible" and "not good role models".

what's the difference between a nurse who smokes and a nurse who is obese? Both would immediately bring to mind unhealthy choices. Both have health ramifications (COPD vs DM, Lung Ca vs HTN, etc.) Both potentially drive up the cost of health care by over-utilization. Why is one less socially acceptable than the other? As long as the smoker-nurse is not reeking of smoke or blowing it in my face and the obese nurse is not reeking of chocolate and dropping crumbs on me, all I care about is this: is he/she a competent nurse, with all that that entails?

just my 2 cents thoughts. My hospital did ban smoking and even offered free assistance to help quit with incentive, but the nurses who smoke had a cow and refused to follow which is why they are now hiding between cars in parking lot to smoke. So making it illegal is a wishful thinking and who can garantee it will stop people from smoking. It is a personal choice and until smoking costs them something, they won't quit. My uncle of years of smoking finally quit when he found out he had a mass in the brain that partially caused by smoking. I talked to him many years and he always avoiding the subject. The nurses as a highly educated people don't need the government to make it illegal to start quit. I am not calling anybody names, it was my observation. I also mentioned that nurses can smoke or do whatever they want, just preferbably not when on duty When they can't get to smoking, they get crankly and making the working environment unpleasant

love being an aide,

Actually you bring up a good point about judging. I have always wanted to be nurse since I was a little girl. I remember telling my peds nurse that when I grew up I was going to be just like her. She was beautiful with long blonde hair, a wonderful smile, and a light around her that made her glow like an angel. I thought she was perfect.

As I have grown up I know that I will never be perfect, and I will never look like a barbie, but I know I have that light around me. I always thought all nurses did. I know it idealistic, but I want to make a difference (even if to just one person), help those that can't help them selves, and thats what makes my light glow. I hope the poor, the smokers, the drug addicts, the overeaters, and ever other type of bad habit shows up on my shift. When they do my job is not to judge them, but to try to help them through understanding, compassion, and the best care I can give.

How can a person say they won't judge patients if they sit in judgement of the rest of the world including their coworkers, friends, and families.

After reading a thread on here a while back in regards to people on welfare I was shocked at what was said. It really made me change my point of view about what I thought that all nurses were like. It also made me more aware that when I enter a medical situation as a patient I am being judged by the clothes I wear, the insurance I have, what the nurse can see when I open my purse, if I smoke, and even what I buy out of the vending machine. Regardless of what I am told I know that these judgements could affect the quality of care that I or my family member receives.

If a nurse HATES all smokers then how can she say she will give quality care to someone she hates? Will it be of the same quality as she would give to someone she didn't hate?

If a nurse is resentful that someone is on welfare, but yet spends a buck to buy chips out of a vending machine will it not affect her attitude toward the person thus affecting the care she gives?

I brought this up to one of my nursing professors who agreed with me totally a couple of semesters ago. Her point was that she spent her career trying to turn out nurses who were in it for the idealism of trying to make a difference. The problem is with nurses in such high demand, and the pay scale, job security, and boom in nursing many people have joined the ranks who aren't in it because they have the light, and want to make a difference. These people are in it for money plain and simple. They would not understand if you explained it 100 times over. To them as long as they follow their care plan they have delivered quality care and thats enough.

We need more nurses who understand the world is full of faulty, sinning, imperfect people. Nurses who do not judge, but look at others with compassion, true understanding, and a passion to make a difference.

judgmentalism is only a means to an end and not the end goal in itself for people that do this. people that do this are motivated by low self esteem. they are in need of a temporary power fix and are looking for unwilling victims to feed it.

as a transsexual woman, i know how bad this can get. the same low self esteem mentality that drives people to harass others for smoking and other personal behaviors drives them to harass me.

people like to call me a boy for the same reason people like to call a middle age african american man, a boy. it is a power trip.

i don't put up with people's obnoxiousness. thankfully, with gender identity protections in many us jurisdictions, an employer is required by law to treat it as the same.

harassment in the name of medical causes, moral causes, or any other cause is far more costly and damaging to society than even drug abuse.

at least drug addicts turn their destructiveness mainly on themselves and the people foolish enough to be around them (except children who don't have a choice until the state intervenes).

low self-esteem obnoxious people turn their destructiveness on other people. it is very contagious disease that undermines the mental health of a group or organization. the average american contributes $ 16.xx an hour to the economy compared to the average norwegian who contributes $ 32.xx an hour.

it is not to say norwegians don't have self-righteous obnoxious people, i am sure they have plenty. the difference is they don't tolerate as much in the work place. a minimal effort to clamp down on it, enough to get workers to cooperate with each other better, doubles their output.

the medical community should do more to treat people who feel the need to get a power trip off of someone else.

So, people who smoke are nonjudgmental?

As someone who helps people quit smoking on a regular basis, I must say I absolutely *cringe* when I see nurses, doctors and other medical personnel standing outside the hospital, smoking. I want to run up to them and say, STOP! You're hurting yourself!

But I don't. I avert my eyes and keep on walking by, knowing that they wouldn't hear my message UNLESS, MAYBE, they were ready to quit. Until they decide for themselves, I'd be wasting my energy and angering the person.

It is, however, still very hard for me to understand how anyone in the medical profession could continue to smoke. But I know that quitting isn't always just about willpower or getting the message. The smoking habit is complex.

By the way, of the hundreds of smokers I've worked with, MAYBE 5 of them started smoking after age 19. What does that tell you? It tells me that if we could get more teenagers to not start in the first place, we'd have way fewer smokers down the line. The cigarette companies insist they are not targeting teen smokers. (Right.) But if they *didn't* have all those teenagers starting each year, they'd eventually go out of business.

I hope I don't sound like I am moralizing. I have seen people after they quit, so happy that they can breathe deeply again, walk up and down a flight of stairs without huffing, and look into their 5-year-old child's eyes and honestly say, "No honey. You can stop worrying now. I'm not a smoker any more." And I've seen people sit and cry, blaming themselves for their recent diagnosis of cancer, emphysema, etc. Even if it's quite possible that the smoking didn't cause their illness, they blame themselves and feel guilty and stupid.

Thank you LoriS, I totally agree with you. A friend of mine from work was VERY sick this past winter and was a heavy smoker. I mean every minute on the minute--outside to smoke. Guess what? She quit!! She is on the unit with me working instead of leaving me alone.

What somebody chooses to do with their own body and time is not my business. I hate the smell of cigarette smoke, and choke up when I get into a cloud of it, but it's still not my business.

What rankles me is nurses who say they don't have enough time to get their jobs done, but who always seem to find time to take a ten minute smoke break several times a day.

I work with several smokers and apart from one who absolutly stinks I never smell it on any of the others. The RN who reaks like an ashtray gone stale has been bought by our manager a bottle of fabreeze to spray on his clothes when he smells worse-we have to just give him the nod and he goes off and sprays.

That's pretty pathetic.

(I think there are too many laws against smoking, so I'm surprised that the government doesn't just ban the sale and distribution of tobacco.)

I support a government ban on the sale and distribution of tobacco. Each year as many more laws are past we become closer to that eventuality. [/quote]

WAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!! Look up the Volstead Act. That worked really well.

People who think morals and thought processes can be legislated make me scratch my head.

People are GOING to smoke, drink, speed, whatever, in spite of (because of?) any law the gooberment chooses to pass.

When we as a society start making people personally accountable for their actions, such as the consequences of smoking, rather than allowing our healthcare costs to be impacted because of it, you may begin to see a change.