From the July 2015 issue of HealthCare Business News magazine

Together, we scaled back sugar-sweetened beverages and are now spending more than $68 million — nearly 70 percent of our beverage budget — on healthy drinks. We also decreased the average amount of meat served per meal and are spending more on local and sustainable food.

Safer chemicals
Patients and staff are exposed to everyday products like furnishings, cleaners, and medical devices that contain chemicals linked to health issues. Through our Safer Chemicals Challenge, we worked with hospitals to replace these products with safer alternatives. Hospitals transitioned to PVC- and DEHPfree devices, purchased more “green”-certified cleaning products and more furnishings (such as chairs or exam tables) without halogenated flame retardants, formaldehyde, perfluorinated compounds and PVC.
We also launched a market transformation strategy to make it easier for hospitals to access products without chemicals of concern. We leveraged increased demand to drive manufacturers to offer safer products in the marketplace. In 2014, we celebrated a major victory when five leading U.S. health systems — Advocate Health Care, Beaumont Health System, Hackensack University Medical Center, Kaiser Permanente, and University Hospitals Health System —announced decisions to no longer purchase any furniture treated with toxic flame retardants. These health systems spend roughly $80 million a year on furnishings. Their decision is a game-changer for the health care industry and the health care supply chain. Healthier Hospitals successfully connected hospitals and the power of the aggregate, bringing our collective purchasing power and powerful data to the table to drive change.

As more hospitals recognize the direct link that environmental impact has with the health of their patients, we recognize that our journey is too powerful to end here.

About the authors: With more than 25 years of experience in environmentally preferable operations, Jeffrey Brown serves as a driving force for sustainability in health care. As executive director of Practice Greenhealth, Brown is a key player in a national movement to increase environmentally preferable operations in health care facilities. Gary Cohen has been a pioneer in the environmental health movement for 30 years. He is co-founder and president of Health Care Without Harm and Practice Greenhealth. He was instrumental in bringing together the NGOs and hospital systems that formed the Healthier Hospitals Initiative. Cohen was executive director of the Environmental Health Fund for many years.

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