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Care Opinion

Smoking

Posted By h4703

"Smoking"

About: Nottinghamshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust / Adult mental health (inpatient)

(as the patient),

I feel as though we have had all our stress relievers taken away from us. What I mean by this is that smoking is one of those relievers, and eating.

When I come to an NHS Trust I'm told they show hospitality but when I'm locked up within these places I feel my human rights are taken away and I don't feel people are taking everybody into account.

We live as a community and live within equal rights. So where is it equal to those who smoke? Is it right to hide the fact of who you are? What I am trying to say is that smokers seem to have to hide in shame! This shouldn't be the case. Is everybody supposed to hide what they are proud of?

I'd like to state that everybody is equal and nobodys higher than each other! I'd like to say we are all creatures of God, it says in the Bible commandments I shalt not kill or take others as our idols. So where have we got the right to mock each other!

What I am trying to say is we all need something, like I need a cigarette to keep calm but it seems to me this is down to somebody else what do I do! I would like my opinion to count in my life choices.

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Responses

Response from Involvement & Experience Officer, Involvement, Experience and Volunteering Team, Nottinghamshire Healthcare NHS Trust 13 years ago
Nottinghamshire Healthcare NHS Trust

Submitted on 10/09/2010 at 12:14
Published on Care Opinion at 01:00

Thank you for your posting. I am sorry you feel your opinion about smoking does not count. The Smoke-Free Policy was implemented for patients in all buildings and grounds within the Trust from 31st March 2007. This followed a Government directive to ban smoking in hospitals in order to improve the physical health of patients, staff and visitors. Your unit will have a local procedure which details the arrangements about smoking as it directly affects you. I understand that there is also a patient guideline which is available on the ward for you to look at as well. Individual patients may be granted an exemption from the smoking ban, although the circumstances for exemption are extremely restrictive. Please speak to your clinical team about this.

All patients are advised about the risks of smoking as well as the benefits of cutting down or quitting. As I am not aware of your personal circumstances relating to smoking it would be worth talking about this with staff to see if there is anything that can be done about providing you with alternative stress relievers or smoking cessation support.

We appreciate your feedback and understand how important this issue is to you. I will pass this posting on to staff.

I hope that you will feel able to discuss this with them.

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