Brandon Regional Hospital is taking a big step this January 1, 2010 and joining many individuals who’ve decided to start out the new year in a healthy, positive way. We’re going completely smoke-free – the whole campus, inside and out, including its two previously designated smoking areas!

More and more, studies are indicating the harmful effects of second hand smoke are much greater than previously thought. The American Cancer Society estimates that 35,000 non-smokers who live with smokers die from heart disease every year with 3,400 lung cancer deaths in non-smoking adults. Research has even indicated that secondhand smoke can be responsible for an increase in the severity and frequency of asthma attacks, lung infections and middle ear infections in children – more than 750,000 each year!

As a major health provider in the community, we decided to take a lead role in improving the health and well-being of anyone who comes to visit the Brandon campus. We care about our employees, our patients and their families, and given our hospital has such busy Obstetrics, Neonatal ICU and Pediatrics programs, we felt it was especially imperative to make the change and go smoke-free all the way.

In preparation of the transition, we’ve been offering support to anyone who might need it and would like to take this opportunity to invite you to join us January 1. Smoking takes a toll you may not even realize until you’ve taken the steps necessary to quit smoking for good. For instance, did you know that according to the American Cancer Society, both your heart rate and blood pressure drop after quitting for only 20 minutes? By three months’ time, your circulation and lung functionality will have improved, and after 10 years, you will have cut your risk of death from lung cancer in half!

We want to encourage our Brandon neighbors to make the transition to smoke-free too and have offered a few helpful tips for kicking the habit:

• Make a plan. Learn about the different methods used to help others stop smoking and set yourself up for success by adopting whatever method is most likely to fit into your schedule and lifestyle. Do you accept new habits and routines more readily when you adopt them gradually or are you more likely to succeed by quitting cold turkey?
  
• Tell others. The more people you tell about your decision, the greater chance you will have to stay committed and focused, and others – especially former smokers – can lend their support to stay on track.
  
• Remind yourself daily of the benefits of quitting. You can measure your success in any number of ways – put aside the money normally spent on cigarettes to use for a special treat (like a massage or new outfit). If you walk for exercise, keep track of the difficulty to walk stairs or add distance and make a note of how much more you can do since going smoke-free. Or pay attention to the taste of a nice dinner or glass of wine. Is your palate noticing new tastes you weren’t able to detect before?
• Stock up. Stock up on smoking-cessation tools and reading material to learn all that you can about the process you’re about to undertake (gums, nicotine replacement or non-nicotine replacement therapies, patches or nasal sprays). Great resources for smoking cessation information include the U.S. government’s own smoke-free initiative (www.smokefree.gov), The American Heart Association (www.americanheart.org), The American Lung Association (www.lungusa.org), and the American Cancer Society (www.cancer.org).
• Be prepared. Nicotine withdrawal isn’t easy. Know the symptoms before you quit. Click here for a video about how to identify signs of withdrawal and manage them. (http://healthlibrary.epnet.com/GetContent.aspx?token=c682f88c-d8ea-4194-b966-ea8d3e4a7df8&chunkiid=488996)
• Believe it. The power of the mind is a powerful thing. If you tell yourself, you can’t do it, you probably know the answer to what happens next.  But if you tell yourself from the beginning and every day that you can overcome your nicotine cravings, you can incorporate other healthier habits into your lifestyle to replace smoking and that you can lead a happy, smoke-free life, you will have much greater odds of success for kicking the habit for life.

It won’t always be easy but with a solid commitment and a supportive network of friends, family and community cheering you on, you CAN make it happen and become smoke-free in 2010, and we’ll be right there alongside you.