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Hospital Board Considers Smoke Free Campus
Published:
Claiborne Progress
Wednesday,
November 4, 2009
by Ashley Collingsworth Staff Writer
During the regular Claiborne County Hospital Board Meeting on Tuesday,
October 27 Dr. Robert Wilmoth brought before the board the idea of making
the Claiborne County Hospital
a smoke free campus.
Dr. Wilmoth gave the management report and stated that during the quality
management meeting that several members of the staff had complained about
the smoking on the campus of the hospital.
“They complained about having to walk through the quote cloud of smoke to
get to the front door,” Dr. Wilmoth said, “They want to know if we could
implement a smoke free facility for the hospital.”
Middlesboro Hospital is a smoke free hospital and Dr.
Wilmoth said they had no problems when they started implanting the policy
for the hospital staff.
“The medical staff is hoping the hospital would consider making it a smoke
free campus,” Dr. Wilmoth said.
Mayor Joe Tyler Duncan questioned whether it would be both cigarettes and
chewing tobacco as well, which brought up making the campus a tobacco free
campus.
“You’re prohibited now within 100 feet of the front door not having any
smoke,” Attorney Jimmy Estep said, “Any public building that’s got over so
many employees has a statute.”
When bringing up the statute board member Mike Robertson asked if the no
smoking policy would add to the statute or change it entirely.
“This wouldn’t change the statute, this would make the campus, all our
property smoke free,” Estep said.
Board member Bill Debusk asked how the statue would be enforced and
Administrator Tim Brown stated
that most hospitals make their employees go to the vehicles to smoke.
Smoking in front of public buildings is a misdemeanor offense but the board
would have to look into how many feet away from the front door it would have
to be.
“You’re not supposed to smoke indoor at all,” Estep said, “So I think what
this does is just a policy by us to prohibit smoking on our properties. I
don’t think it changes anything or adds anything but it will take away
smoking behind that wall.”
The area in front of the hospital entrance is for patients and family only,
employees are not supposed to be smoking in that part of the building.
“Hospitals are finally starting to recognize the fact that smoking will kill
you,” Dr. Wilmoth said, “I see patients daily whose lives are changed
drastically by smoking.”
This opened the discussion about how the policy would be enforced if it were
implemented to the campus.
“I think if we are going to be leaders of promoting good health in our
community, we have to lead by example,” Dr. Wilmoth said.
Hospital security would be relied on when it comes to enforcing the policy
by asking smokers to put out their cigarettes because it would be
prohibited.
Board member Bill DeBusk was concerned about the smoke breaks taken by
workers.
“There are probably 600 workers and out of those probably 100 or more
smoke,” DeBusk said, “If you ask them to go to their vehicles then you would
have to add time onto their breaks in order to implement the smoke free
campus.”
Dr. Wilmoth said there are no smoking signs everywhere including out by the
ER doors but they are not seen because the people that smoke are standing in
front of them and the only way to enforce no smoking at entrances would be
to adopt a campus wide policy.
“What we would have to do would be to grandfather in the residents that
smoke,” Brown said, “Then alter our admission policies that we’re smoke free
and eventually become 100-percent smoke free.”
Brown said that he is going to check with other smoke free facilities and
see what their admission policies are.
Employees will be offered alternatives to help them quit smoking.
“I believe if we are going to do it, the employees should be offered, free,
100-percent, the opportunity to do it,” Mike Robertson said.
The board will start looking into enforcing the statutes to stop the smoking
in the front door of the hospital and looking into implementing a policy and
bringing it back before the board next month.
Also, during the quality management meeting it was brought to board member
Betsy Shoffner’s attention that the times on any of the clocks in the
hospital match. Brown stated that several people had brought the time up and
they were working on getting that fixed as soon as possible.
The board approved the quality management report after a motion was made by
Shoffner and seconded by Robertson.
Also on the agenda was the monthly financial report along with a review of
debt.
September was a loss but the loss was considerably less than months before
with a decrease in expenses and the overall revenue held up through the
month.
Cash flow for the month of September showed an increase with accounts
receivable down under six million.
The posting of payments was up concurrent and there was an increase of
collections also accounts receivable was down under four million where they
were at the start of the year.
Net revenue per patient is down from 92-thousand to 90-thousand in the 2009
fiscal year.
“We are working hard on the processes where we believe dollars are falling
through the cracks,” Brown said, “Such as with insurance that has to be
filed within a certain amount of time, also precertification’s through
insurances, things like that can add up.”
They are looking for ways to close those holes and capture the money that
comes from those services.
The debt the hospital owes was also discussed and reports have been
requested that will be broken down by department.
“We had a pretty good month revenue wise,” Brown says, “We’ve got some
positive things going.”
The reports will be brought back before the board at the next meeting which
will be held on November 24 at 6:00 in the conference room.
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