Florida and Texas hospitals advance their eco-friendly efforts:
Deciding where to toss a dirty diaper or how many linens to grab for a patient may seem like insignificant decisions in the midst of a busy shift, but nurses in Florida and Texas are learning the dozens of small choices they make each day can add up quickly when it comes to environmental impact.
As part of an effort to become a leader in green healthcare, Baptist Health South Florida recently launched an initiative to reduce the amount of red bag waste, or RBW, the six hospitals in the system were generating. Leaders of Baptist Health’s Green Team suspected they could reduce RBW by educating employees about what did not need to go into these bags. By law, any waste that includes blood-soaked bandages or disposable devices such as syringes should be placed into a red bag. Items containing feces, urine, vomit or sputum can go in the regular trash.
RBW produces a larger carbon footprint than other trash because it requires more energy to treat it before it is disposed of in a landfill. Baptist Health’s employees were trained in the sometimes-subtle differences between different types of waste. The result: In the past two years, the facilities within the Baptist Health system have cut down the amount of RBW by 30% to 60% per location and saved hundreds of thousands of dollars per year — not to mention the benefit to the environment.