During the month of September, Emily, the Community Health Engagement Officer for West Hampshire, Southampton and Isle of Wight wheelchair service began engaging and networking with the NHS stop smoking service, provided by Solutions4health in Hampshire and Isle of Wight.

The smokefree services have advisors who regularly host stop smoking clinics within the community, consisting of 1:1 sessions with service users who wish to quit smoking, and may require support and guidance. Both services in Hampshire and Isle of Wight enable their service users to access clinical and non-clinical interventions seamlessly.

Stop smoking campaign is currently a Hampshire wide health priority, therefore it was a cause the local Ross Care team felt strongly about being involved in and helping to support the cause. Especially as many of our own service users could find it highly beneficial for their health if they were to stop smoking. On top of this, there is financial benefits of giving up smoking, as the average pack of 20 cigarettes cost £12.84 according to reports published in March 2023.

 
Emily Galton, community health engagement officer says “Being involved with this health campaign is quite close to my heart, as my own mum was a wheelchair user herself and had various health problems. Unfortunately, she did regularly smoke too. Unfortunately, the level of awareness and understanding of the dangers of smoking wasn’t quite the same twenty years ago, as what it is today. I wish I could have helped convince her to give up smoking many years ago, there’s a possibility she could have prolonged her life if she had given up smoking. I’m someone that feels passionate about helping others, so if I can help other people in the long run, it would really make all the difference.”

We are delighted to share that a stop smoking clinic will be hosted at the Ross Care wheelchair service centre in Newport on Thursdays. The first clinic will be held on Thursday 5^th October between 10am – 12noon. These clinics will be open to our service users to access, via a referral to smokefree island. You can contact the smokefree island team directly, or you can speak to the Ross Care team who will be able to refer you on via the community health engagement officer.

Our community health engagement officer has also been engaging with the smokefree Hampshire team too, who are also keen to hold stop smoking clinics in our Chandlers Ford service centre. The details are still being arranged for this, but this looks to be a promising working relationship for the future.