The other night I was walking to one of our units that happens to be down a very long hallway, at the end of which is a hospital exit. As I came around the corner off the elevator I was immediately behind a youngish man in a wheelchair in a hospital gown pushing himself by hand. That's a long hallway to push yourself by hand. My immediate reaction was, OF COURSE!, to help him but then I saw the pack of cigarettes and lighter in his lap.
Immediately a few things came to mind:
1) Who brought him the wheelchair and put him in it?
2) The hospital is a non-smoking CAMPUS, meaning not just within the hospital but within all of it's borders (streets) so his closest "legal" smoking area was basically the middle of James River Freeway (not just outside that exit door).
3) Which comes first: guarding the patient's health, assisting the patient with world class customer service, or forcibly enforcing hospital rules when a patient is determined to not to comply?
4) But what if he codes or otherwise hurts himself while doing what he's attempting to do? He's still a patient of the hospital; we're still liable for his well-being.
I'll be honest. I didn't help him. I figured if he wanted to smoke bad enough he'd get himself out to the exit so that security (who happened to still have a booth at that exit at that time) could tell him whatever they wanted to tell him. He'd already obviously talked someone out of a wheelchair.
The other night I was walking to one of our units that happens to be down a very long hallway, at the end of which is a hospital exit. As I came around the corner off the elevator I was immediately behind a youngish man in a wheelchair in a hospital gown pushing himself by hand. That's a long hallway to push yourself by hand. My immediate reaction was, OF COURSE!, to help him but then I saw the pack of cigarettes and lighter in his lap.
Immediately a few things came to mind:
1) Who brought him the wheelchair and put him in it?
2) The hospital is a non-smoking CAMPUS, meaning not just within the hospital but within all of it's borders (streets) so his closest "legal" smoking area was basically the middle of James River Freeway (not just outside that exit door).
3) Which comes first: guarding the patient's health, assisting the patient with world class customer service, or forcibly enforcing hospital rules when a patient is determined to not to comply?
4) But what if he codes or otherwise hurts himself while doing what he's attempting to do? He's still a patient of the hospital; we're still liable for his well-being.
I'll be honest. I didn't help him. I figured if he wanted to smoke bad enough he'd get himself out to the exit so that security (who happened to still have a booth at that exit at that time) could tell him whatever they wanted to tell him. He'd already obviously talked someone out of a wheelchair.
What would you do?