Dr. Brendon Stiles is a thoracic surgeon at Weill Cornell Medical Center, so he knows first hand the damage that smoking cigarettes can do to a person’s lungs. Still, he says he avoids any language that would make people he’s treating feel guilty about having cancer, or feel like it’s their fault.
“I certainly don’t give my patients a hard time if they’re vaping; I actually don’t give them a hard time if they’re still smoking,” Dr. Stiles said. “It’s very, very hard to quit, and they’ve got so many things going through their mind and so much anxiety at the time of their surgery that I don’t have a policy, ‘hey, gotta stop smoking.’ I think surgery is a great learning opportunity, it’s a great time for them to be in the hospital where hopefully they’ll stop after that. But, it’s tough to really beat people up about that in my opinion.”
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