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I couldn’t believe this when I first heard about it, I thought it had to be some kind of spoof, a prank, but no!! It’s actually begun to happen. Iv’e been waiting months for appointments and the reason, or so iv’e been led to believe, is due to overwhelming numbers of patients, and needing more funding to put more clinics into place before those numbers have a hope in hell of getting anywhere. Not to worry though eh, at least the smokers in the community will have a nice dry comfy shelter to smoke in!!! :twisted:
12 March 2010
Queen’s Hospital main entrance
PLANS to spend £60,000 on smoking shelters at Queen’s Hospital have sparked outrage.
The hospital in Rom Valley Way, Romford is set to build two shelters in a bid to stop a number of patients and visitors smoking outside the main entrance.
Visitor Keith Price said: “Smoking kills. People go to hospital to get better and smoking should not happen in any way or form in a hospital. By building these shelters, they are saying it is OK to smoke.”
Work is already under way on the smoking shelters – one outside the accident and emergency department (A&E) and the other in the main car park area.
Sodexo, the company providing cleaning and portering services at Queen’s, will also fund a smoking warden to encourage people to use the shelters.
Ten years ago Keith, 66 was diagnosed with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, having smoked for about 30 years.
He argues that the hospital is encouraging people to smoke.
Cllr Ted Eden, chairman of the health overview and scrutiny committee, said: “I cannot believe they are building two smoking shelters. It is a waste of money when they are trying to get people to stop smoking.”
Since 2007 the hospital has struggled to stop people smoking. Patients go downstairs in their wheelchairs to have a cigarette.
John Goulston, chief executive of Barking, Havering and Redbridge Hospitals Trust, which runs Queen’s, said: “We have tried extremely hard to discourage smoking at both of our hospital sites [Queen’s and King George].
“There are prominent notices displayed and we have an automatic recording, triggered by smoke, asking people to extinguish their cigarettes.
“However, some people choose to ignore these signs, and continue to smoke cigarettes right outside the hospital entrances.
“There have also been occasions when people have become very aggressive when asked to extinguish their cigarettes.
“After lengthy consideration, we have decided to put up smoking shelters to encourage people away from the main entrances if they insist on smoking. The shelters should mean that staff, patients and visitors will not have to walk past smokers to get into and out of our hospitals.”
News of the shelters comes days after NHS Havering set up a stall at the Liberty shopping centre, Romford, to give shoppers advice about quitting.
Quit, a charity which helps people to stop smoking, said: “We do not encourage smoking shelters. We feel the hospitcal should encrouage staff, patients and visitors to quit smoking.”
Sorry, being in the chronic pain I am i’m a little incensed at this !!! :twisted:
I’m really very tempted to write to Sodexo, the cleaning and portering company who won the contract, claiming that they would provide a much better, more effiecient cleaning service etc etc., You only have to look at half the people wearing the uniform to wonder whether they themselves have been introduced lately to a bar of soap!! but anyway! I wonder if they intend to just ask people not to smoke outside the doors, or if they intend or are able to, impose, on the spot fines! if so, that money of course would be able to be ploughed back into the hospital and hopefully help towards the cost of extra clinics for the people who need them, the people who are sick, because as strange as it may be, I was always under the impression that thats what hospitals were for, that was the main reason for them,,,,,,,,”SICK PEOPLE”!! :twisted:
sparked outrage? :lol:
It’s about time that the anti-smoking Nazis realised that if it wasn’t for the taxes paid by those who choose to smoke – you could kiss the NHS goodbye.
Budgets slashed; staff laid off; clinics closed; the list is endless. So building a nice warm shelter for the NHS financial sponsors to enjoy smoking in is a small price to pay.
PB I promise you, i’m not an anti-smoking nazi 8) I am an ex smoker but i’m not one of the worst kind of anti smokers who say its a disgusting habit etc etc., Each to their own! it’s peoples choice to smoke and its also theirs to stop, like me. I’m very aware of how much tax it generates and as much as the goverment make all the right noises and moves, its never going to be banned completely because of the amount of money it makes, at least I dont think so anyway.I do object though to these shelters all the same, especially when your contiually told that they dont have the funds at present and are awaiting new funds to put in place for more clinics, which are needed. This £60,000 could be better spent on people who are desperately waiting for treatment to ease the pain theyre in.
Oh and before anyone thinks otherwise, my own pain has nothing at all to do with smoking!!
They are trying to introduce an 18 week rule from the date your referral is received until you get treatment. If you are waiting months, you should be able to ask to be referred to a different hospital.
@minim wrote:
They are trying to introduce an 18 week rule from the date your referral is received until you get treatment. If you are waiting months, you should be able to ask to be referred to a different hospital.
Iv’e done that Mims, but my GP advises me that by doing that, i’ll end up going back to the beginning and effectively starting all over again, so i’ll be no better off, how true this is who knows.
Iv’e written a letter to the PCT, iv’e sent copies to the Chief Exec, my own MP and the state minister for health which includes the NHS, Rt Hon Andy Burnham, again how far it’ll get me is anyones guess. I’m just so pissed off with being in such pain i’m prepared to pretty much do whatever it takes now.
Also, this afternoon, I played a little experiment. I found the name of my consultant on the net, he’s very qualified in his field, lots of letters after his name etc., He holds a private clinic on a Friday at the Nuffield Centre, which is in Brentwood, bout 8 miles from where I live. So I sent an email, explaning that I cannot wait much longer for treatment and enquired about the possibility of seeing him in his private clinic, I said I would be grateful if they could help me and let me know as soon as possible. I had a reply a couple of hours later, to say that he had a slot on Friday evening and would be happy to see me, yea I just bet he would!!! I intend to send copies of the emails to the chief executive, see what he has to say.
It sounds like he is part time NHS and part private. A lot of consultants are not full time employees, so am not sure how much good your email will do. They have a set amount of NHS clinics. However, if your GP thinks you are urgent, he can put pressure on for you to be seen earlier, AND if you phone up you may be able to get a cancellation if someone pulls out at the last minute!
It infuriates me that with appointments being in such sort supply, people regular do not attend without phoning up to let anyone know. Their appointment slot goes empty! Someone else isn’t being seen, and the hospital doesn’t get paid.
I half jokingly said i’d like to see people getting fined for missing their appointments without good reason!
I understand its the case that he’s part time. He works 3 n 1/2 days at queens and the other day and a half and a couple of evenings he deals with private work.
In his defense, my GP has tried that and he was given the same answer I was. It’s not a case of ringing to see if there are any cancellations, the clinics just dont exist at the present time. He does hold clinics there, as do the two other pain management consultants. The whole system is currently waiting for extra funding to be put into place for more clinics, to deal with the amount of patients waiting, the current lists are full until the end of June at the moment. Thats why i’m so infuriated that the hospital intend to spend all that money on smoking shelters, when there are people, like myself, who are in chronic pain, waiting for a decision on whether theres money for extra clinics.
I think it’d be a good idea Mims, that of fining people who don’t keep appointments and don’t bother to let them know. Not in the short term of course, but if people got used to the idea that they didn’t bother to pick up the phone and cancel an appt or they’d be fined, it might make them think about doing just that
The main reason why people fail to attend for their NHS appointments is that they know they won’t be allowed to smoke a ciggie while they are kept waiting.
Rather than punish smokers for failing to attend, surely it would be better to provide them with ‘smoking shelters’ at a minimal cost (say around £60,000) so that they could pop out for a relaxing ciggie during their endless wait to see an NHS official for their routine dose of patronisation.
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