Hospital Impact reports that CEO of Inova Health Systems in Fairfax, V.A., J. Knox Singleton, co-authored a book, “Sustainability for Healthcare Management: A Leadership Imperative.” This book links health values with sustainability drivers and challenges healthcare leaders to think through the implications of decisions from fiscal, societal, and environmental perspectives. Those in healthcare have a very important job, they need to be there for their patients as best they can and put the populations’ needs up high. Taking the ahm 250 exam can help stand them in better stead on how they can handle these various situations in a professional way.
Enter the Healthier Hospitals Initiative, a campaign in the United States and Canada designed to improve the health of patients, staff, and the community; reduce environmental impact by the sector, and experience considerable fiscal savings that reduce the overall national healthcare costs through better public health.
The foundation of HHI consists of 13 sponsoring health systems representing more than 500 hospitals with more than $20 billion in purchasing power, and three nonprofit organizations — Health Care Without Harm, The Center for Health Design and Practice Greenhealth. HHI encourages environmentally responsible practices by spurring sustainable day-to-day operations across the healthcare sector.
To mark its one-year anniversary, HHI released its first progress report, which collected data on the environmentally sustainable efforts by 370 hospitals across the nation and Canada. These HHI-member hospitals indicated they have reduced their environmental footprint, lowered costs and improved patient health by incorporating sustainability initiatives into their business models. I am very excited about HHI’s first report because it shows definitive movement toward a more sustainable hospital environment. The report serves as a baseline from which we can measure our future successes by encouraging hospitals to purchase more environmentally-preferable supplies, serve healthier foods, use less energy, reduce waste and more.
Some of the report’s key findings include:
- More than 50 million pounds of materials recycled, plus an additional 61.5 million pounds of construction and demolition waste kept out of landfills through reuse and recycling;
- About $32 million in savings resulting from single-use medical device reprocessing;
As a hospital executive who is passionate about change, I challenge my colleagues to join me in promoting environmental healthcare.
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