Who can give me specific examples of smoking in hospitals on TV shows?

[gstharr]

Ben Casey, Dr. Kildare.

[Bluegoat]

Like a walk in fume cupboard?

 

Yes, pretty much.  They have a seperate ventilation system, like you see in a workshop.

[Anne in CA]

:lol: I remember making ashtrays too. My daughter brought home a "pot to put things in" because they still hadn't quite moved on from ashtrays.

That's better than a pot for your "pot" which may be a craft the next generation's kids bring home from school with so many states legalizing pot!

[ktgrok]

I remember making ashtrays in school too!!!  And smoking areas in restaurants, and those machines in the lobby of restaurants that vended cigarets. I remember my parents letting me pull the lever to get them!

[katilac]

I remember making ashtrays in school too!!!  And smoking areas in restaurants, and those machines in the lobby of restaurants that vended cigarets. I remember my parents letting me pull the lever to get them!

 

Louisiana did not have a minimum purchase age until 1991! And it was a big, fat, hairy deal. I remember a representative stating, with a straight face, what an outrage it was that parents would not be able to send their kids to the store for their cigarettes  :huh:

[LucyStoner]

When we moved from a Seattle suburb to Louisville KY in 1991, people still smoked in grocery stores.  The produce was covered in that smell.  Bleck.  It grossed out even my parents, who were at the time both still smokers.  My mom never smoked inside though and she made my dad follow the same rule, she didn't want anyone smoking inside or in a car around us kids.  

 

Recently, the realization that "This is Us" is set in two different time periods hit me when the firefighter who brought in Randall was talking to Jack (the Dad) in front of the nursery and I'm like, where do they still have windowed nurseries like that and then the firefighter lights up and I'm like "riiight, they don't.  This is the early 1980s"

[LucyStoner]

It was 1990, so a while ago. Back then every restaurant had smoking areas, planes had smoking areas, hospitals and hotel rooms had smoking rooms, and people walked around grocery stores with cigarettes.

 

At some point in the 1980s, smoking in certain places was banned in my area of WA State.  I know this since it literally floored us to see people smoking in grocery stores when we moved to Kentucky in 1991. 

[LucyStoner]

I hate smoking, but I'm actually not a big fan of the policies that have people smoking only off hospital property.  I hate going by the hospital and seeing a bunch of people in gowns pulling IVs huddled on the sidewalk in the wind and weather.

 

My mom once quit smoking successfully after an extended hospital stay because smoking was banned.  She needed to get through the worst of the cravings.  She might still be alive had this happened earlier in her life.  Instead, she died at age 54, primarily due to smoking-related lung cancer and smoking-related heart disease.  I might intellectually understand that people can't be saved from themselves, but emotionally, I'd vastly prefer to have a now 63-year-old mother here with me.  I wish hospitals had banned smoking much earlier.  

[historically accurate]

You're right on the year. I think the south was slower to change. I don't remember exactly how recently it changed, but when we visited my grandad in NC, they were still smoking indoors in most places well into the first decade of the 2000s.

 

ETA: smoke free NC was passed banning indoor smoking in 2010.

 

I was just talking to my kids about this in the car. We drove by an accounting firm in the town next over, and I mentioned that I had applied to work there once. I was telling them that the owner had told me I wasn't a true accountant because I didn't drink coffee or smoke. I didn't work there partly because I walked out of there with my hair stinking of cig smoke and partly because the owner was a putz. This was 1998ish.

 

I also mentioned that after oldest was born, the company I worked for sent me to California for a week or two. I told them how I was in love with the no-smoking restaurants. We were still in the smoking/non-smoking sections here in IL. This would've been early 2000s. 

 

Looks like IL banned smoking in indoor public areas in 2008

[AnnE-girl]

I was just talking to my kids about this in the car. We drove by an accounting firm in the town next over, and I mentioned that I had applied to work there once. I was telling them that the owner had told me I wasn't a true accountant because I didn't drink coffee or smoke. I didn't work there partly because I walked out of there with my hair stinking of cig smoke and partly because the owner was a putz. This was 1998ish.

 

I also mentioned that after oldest was born, the company I worked for sent me to California for a week or two. I told them how I was in love with the no-smoking restaurants. We were still in the smoking/non-smoking sections here in IL. This would've been early 2000s.

 

Looks like IL banned smoking in indoor public areas in 2008

It was that recently? I remember when one of the suburbs was the first to ban smoking in restaurants around 2003. It was a big deal and the one 24 hour diner in the area ended up closing because they lost so much business from the smoking ban.

 

I'm kind of amazed that it took as long as it did to ban smoking in hospitals. Isn't it really dangerous with the oxygen hook-ups in all the rooms? And wasn't that an episode of ER when the patient on oxygen blew himself up/set himself on fire when he lit his cigarette? I vaguely remember some tv show with that, but it's been 20-some years.

[gaillardia]

Never mind.

I was having an Emily Litella moment

Edited April 11, 2017 by Gaillardia

[KungFuPanda]

Yes, I am sure I have "issues" about the fact that I routinely meet people who defend their choice not to buckle up, not to use a carseat with their toddler (or make them wear a seatbelt), not to stop smoking in closed cars with their babies and/or while pregnant with "well, we all survived".

I read it like she was amazed we survived against the odds, not like she thought any of those things were ever good or should be defended. Everyone here knows that the laws were changed for a reason. Nobody here is going to defend smoking in the delivery room, so there's no actual argument there or reason to take issue with it.

[Bluegoat]

My mom once quit smoking successfully after an extended hospital stay because smoking was banned.  She needed to get through the worst of the cravings.  She might still be alive had this happened earlier in her life.  Instead, she died at age 54, primarily due to smoking-related lung cancer and smoking-related heart disease.  I might intellectually understand that people can't be saved from themselves, but emotionally, I'd vastly prefer to have a now 63-year-old mother here with me.  I wish hospitals had banned smoking much earlier.  

 

I think that is what they hope - people will end up quitting.

 

But - when I see people in robes with IV poles standing in the snow on the sidewalk, I tend to think that isn't going to happen for everyone.  And those people are patients too.

 

I also think - how would they be dealing with those people if they had some other sort of addiction when they were in hospital, and the answer isn't send them into the street to get their fix.  The hospital has ways to help those people up to and including giving them drugs.  I feel like there is a kind of widespread moralism that goes on with the smokers that isn't there for other addicts.

 

ETA - being in hospital for another issue isn't always going to be the best time for a person to quit, either.

Edited April 11, 2017 by Bluegoat

[kiana]

nevermind, too much personal info

 

Edited April 11, 2017 by kiana

[LucyStoner]

I think that is what they hope - people will end up quitting.

 

But - when I see people in robes with IV poles standing in the snow on the sidewalk, I tend to think that isn't going to happen for everyone. And those people are patients too.

 

I also think - how would they be dealing with those people if they had some other sort of addiction when they were in hospital, and the answer isn't send them into the street to get their fix. The hospital has ways to help those people up to and including giving them drugs. I feel like there is a kind of widespread moralism that goes on with the smokers that isn't there for other addicts.

 

ETA - being in hospital for another issue isn't always going to be the best time for a person to quit, either.

There's no way to allow people to smoke in a hospital without compromising the air quality inside for other patients and the staff. Presumably many of the people in the hospital are more impacted by smoke than merely being bothered.

 

Despite your assertion, there's no way to ventilate an enclosed space to mitigate the issues raised by second hand smoke.

 

Addiction is an ugly thing but no one is forcing people to leave the hospital. Unlike many other addictive options, cigarettes are legal and if people choose to go outside to smoke in thin gowns, that's on them. It might make you feel uncomfortable but it is ultimately the decision of the smoker. For hospitals it is also an issue that has legal

and accreditation implications. I also know that, at least in the hospitals I am familiar with, nicotine or a smoking cessation medication (if safe for the patient) is available. More and more doctors are aware of withdrawal issues and willing to account for them in their post-op planning.

Edited April 11, 2017 by LucyStoner

[shawthorne44]

A long time ago I read an article saying that for many people the lingering general post-surgery crappy feeling was actually caffeine withdrawal.  

 

My mother quit when she was extremely sick.  It was a respiratory problem and also the rule was no smoking in the house.  Mom was bedridden, so she stopped smoking.  She said when she'd tried to quit before she felt horrible from withdrawal, and she associated not smoking with crappy feeling.  But, since she was very sick, any crappy feeling was assumed to be from the sickness.   Then as she got better from the sickness eventually she felt as good as she had before.  Then she started to feel even better than she had before since she wasn't smoking.  So, that time quitting was only positive.  

 

[KungFuPanda]

I was once in the hospital. My sister is a nurse and she told me to make sure I asked for my morning and afternoon tea while I was admitted. She told me people often don't think of getting their caffeine fix in the hospital, and then they get the headache. It's probably not the best situation for giving up anything. Still, I think a lot of the smoking laws changed not to protect people from themselves, but to protect staff from second hand smoke. Even if you could vent a room and protect the other rooms, hospital staff would still have to work in that room.

[swellmomma]

I read it like she was amazed we survived against the odds, not like she thought any of those things were ever good or should be defended. Everyone here knows that the laws were changed for a reason. Nobody here is going to defend smoking in the delivery room, so there's no actual argument there or reason to take issue with it.

That's exactly how I meant it. I am in favor of better safety, and was not glorifying the lack of it. I was just saying it is amazing we survived.

[athomeontheprairie]

Louisiana did not have a minimum purchase age until 1991! And it was a big, fat, hairy deal. I remember a representative stating, with a straight face, what an outrage it was that parents would not be able to send their kids to the store for their cigarettes :huh:

I remember vending machines for cigarettes in the early 90s in the Midwest. My dad would send me to the local restaurant that had one to pick his up. This would have been at the earliest 1991 on Kansas.

The machine waa different than current vending machines, I remember thinking "this is awesome!"

[Anne in CA]

I think that is what they hope - people will end up quitting.

 

But - when I see people in robes with IV poles standing in the snow on the sidewalk, I tend to think that isn't going to happen for everyone.  And those people are patients too.

 

I also think - how would they be dealing with those people if they had some other sort of addiction when they were in hospital, and the answer isn't send them into the street to get their fix.  The hospital has ways to help those people up to and including giving them drugs.  I feel like there is a kind of widespread moralism that goes on with the smokers that isn't there for other addicts.

 

ETA - being in hospital for another issue isn't always going to be the best time for a person to quit, either.

My father quit smoking in the hospital. He couldn't go outside to smoke and he was hopped up with opiates so he didn't miss the cigarettes. By the time he could go outside to smoke he was over the craving. 

[Retired]

I don't remember any shows but I'm a 47 yo nurse that entered nursing when the staff had to smoke outside but the patients could still smoke in their rooms this was in 92.  I was smoker back then and had a women that had a partial lung removal.   She was still on oxygen begging for a cigarette.  Part of my orders was to turn off oxygen every 2 hours and let her smoke.  This was in 95 which is when I quit at age 25.  She was a wake-up call for sure.  THe hospital went  complete smoke free late 90's except for outside by the trash can smoking areas.  THis was in Alabama which usually 10 years behind the New York/LA type places. 

 

  I know its only been the past 10 years that their has been a campus free smoking for employees but the patients still have the trash can smoking area.  We usually do a nicotine patch while in- patient but some pt refuse so they are taken out to the loading area/dumpster area of the hospital.  I don't see many anymore because most will just do the patch at least while a patient.  I off course don't' know how many stick with it when discharged.   

 

as for second hand smoke issues the CDC no type ventilation  can prevent spread of second hand smoke.  THis is why the hospital went completely smoke free.  They thought negative pressure room stuff like that would work but the science proved not . I dont' understand all the science but there is no indoor safe way to smoke and not spread it with current science knowledge

 

 

 

[foxbridgeacademy]

Call the midwife

That's what I was going to say, I couldn't believe it but they are trying to stay true to the times.  I remember in the 80's the local hospital had a smoking room.  Also we could smoke ON campus in a designated area next to my high school (1989) but they stopped that in 1990, so we all just crossed the street.

[Bambam]

We watched a few old episodes of Emergency! and the doctors/nurses smoked in several episodes. 

Edited April 12, 2017 by Bambam