HOSPITALIZED SODA POP

Now don’t get me wrong. I like soda pop–all kinds. I have for over 60 years and will continue to enjoy an occasional one. While keeping that in mind though, before I comment further I need to momentarily switch gears and say something about cigarettes.

When I was a kid I would periodically accompany my father, a general practitioner (see Inaugural), on rounds at the hospital. Now my father smoked as did many physicians and nurses of the day. It was not uncommon to see cigarette smoke wafting through the air at the nurses’ station and doctors writing their notes while holding a lit cigarette in one hand. And it was not out of the ordinary to see a patient with a burning cigarette as long as there was no oxygen on in the room. Cigarette vending machines were also commonplace. Clearly all that has changed for reasons now well known.

Now back to soda pop. As commented upon in one of my previous blogs (Oscar) morbid obesity and super morbid obesity are becoming commonplace. Especially in recent years it was not an infrequent observation of mine as I entered this type of patient’s hospital room (or any patient’s room for that matter) to see one, if not two, if not more, sodas sitting on a patient’s bedside table. Regular size, individual size, and even an occasional 32 ounce size carbonated beverage would rest there. Sometimes brought in by family (especially the 32 ounce ones) but most often ordered from the hospital dietary department. More and more these sodas would be “diet”, lulling, in my opinion, the patient (or anybody else) into thinking that these could be consumed with impunity in the belief that they were “healthier” and the contribution to weight gain, let alone other medical problems (e.g. diabetes, heart failure), was negligible if not impossible. It became a common practice of mine to point out the potential problems that many of these individuals could face in light of their ongoing consumption and, not infrequently, I would remove them from the bedside table (sometimes throwing them directly into the trash to make a point). While there were some who acknowledged a new understanding that “diet” sodas may not be all they are cracked up to be, many didn’t care and the tables would be repopulated with soda the next day.

So why did I bring up cigarettes? Next time you wander through the halls of a hospital, as I have on many an occasion while making rounds, take note of the number of soda vending machines there are, or go down to the hospital cafeteria and see the available array of soda fountain options, or watch as a patient orders a soda from the hospital dietary department. My guess is the hospitals make significant money on selling sodas just like they used to with cigarettes while giving the patient what they want. So is health care sending the wrong message to patients just the way we did with cigarettes “back in the day?” Is it time for hospitals to be “soda pop free” just as they are now smoke free?

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