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Community question: Sustainable solutions for prosthetic waste
A big concern regarding prosthetics and orthotics is the lack of lack of viable recycling opportunities for materials and waste. The process involves the use of a variety of plastics and plasters that can be a challenge for facilities to manage.
If you any of our readers have come up with a sustainable solution for managing prosthetic/orthotic waste please contact Tsue Andersen at Tsue.Andersen@albertahealthservices.ca
Thank you!
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CCHL 2023 National Awards Program
The Canadian College of Health Leaders is inviting nominations for the 2023 National Awards Program. The final day to submit Individual Award Nominations is November 30, 2022.
If you know of a specific individual that is worthy of recognition, we encourage you to pursue the nomination for the following awards:
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Patient and caregiver scholarship opportunity
The 2023 International Congress on Academic Medicine (ICAM) welcomes the attendance of patients and caregivers to their upcoming conference with discounted registrations for on-site attendance - and are being provided complimentary virtual access to streamed content.
To support patients and caregivers the ICAM is also offering seven scholarships. The scholarship will contribute to travel costs, meals and cover on-site registration.
Deadline to submit an application: January 6th, 2023
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Release of RETScreen® Version 9.0
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Version 9 of the RETScreen® Clean Energy Management Software platform was released on October 13th, 2022 and is now available for download from the RETScreen website. This update has arrived with a number of salient new features to enhance the RETScreen experience!
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One less plastic project
BC Green Care
The Royal Columbian Hospital (RCH) is reducing single-use plastic waste one spoon at a time.
You might be asking, what difference does a spoon make? On its own, a disposable spoon might feel like a drop in the barrel, but the RCH’s Food Service Department realized that changing how they used this one, everyday piece of cutlery could lead to positive environmental impacts.
Typically, nursing units use single-use plastic spoons to give medication and snacks to patients. After use, these spoons end up in the landfill. RCH tracked their spoon usage, they discovered that 229,000 disposable plastic spoons were brought into RCH between August 2020 and July 2021.
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Health care facilities at risk of more climate events if emissions aren't reduced
Healthcare Facilities Today
A report from the World Economic Forum found that health care systems contribute more than 4 percent of carbon dioxide emissions.
Negligent climate actions are not only costing more money, but they are also taking years off of people’s lives.
The World Economic Report suggests multiple actions health care systems can implement in order to reduce their carbon footprint. These include decarbonization, implementation of renewable energy, zero-emission procurement, further research and government action plans for climate-smart health care.
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Is your asthma inhaler ruining the planet?
Canada's National Observer
Every time they use their puffers, up to six million Canadians with respiratory diseases like asthma and emphysema unknowingly release dangerous greenhouse gasses into the air. One hundred puffs of a metered dose inhaler (MDI) produce as many greenhouse gases (GHGs) emissions as a 290-kilometre drive in a gas-powered car.
So now a group of health professionals at the Toronto Academic Health Science Network is steering patients and physicians toward more climate-conscious and clinically sound ways to control respiratory disease. The health group known as Sustainable Health System Community of Practice is using a combination of proper inhaler techniques and lower-carbon alternatives, such as dry powder inhalers, to reach that goal.
The group also recommends no longer prescribing puffers for the 30 per cent of users who don’t need them.
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Climate change, health, and discrimination: Action towards racial justice
The Lancet
Although discourse on climate change and health acknowledges principles of equity, little attention is given to underlying structural discrimination and the need for racial justice.
From vulnerable communities in Puerto Rico coping with the effects of hurricane Fiona, to excessive heat in racially segregated neighbourhoods in the USA, to the tens of millions of people who have been displaced by flooding in Pakistan during 2022, minoritised populations bear the brunt of the health impacts of climate change, despite being least responsible for it.
Together, racism and climate change interact and have disproportionate effects on the lives of minoritised people within countries and between the Global North and the Global South.
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Better hospital food on the menu
NHS England
We’ve all had times where we’ve been unwell and not felt like eating, especially as a hospital inpatient, or when we have reached for unhealthy food when we are busy, tired or stressed at work. But a nutritious meal can have a profound impact both on our mental and physical health and on our ability to recover from illness or surgery.
The NHS is one of the largest providers of food and drink services in the country, providing over 199 million meals per year for patients, staff and visitors, but we know that catering in hospitals is not always as good as it could be.
As part of the Independent Review of Hospital Food (2020) recommendations highlighted the need for updated food and drink standards to ensure that patients, staff and visitors have good quality, healthy, nutritious food options, wherever they are in the country.
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Climate: Planetary health menus and procurement
Nourish
More and more, literature on food, dietary patterns, and health outcomes encourages planetary health diets, which double the consumption of fruits, vegetables, and plant-based proteins, and decrease the consumption of added sugars and red meat by at least fifty percent.
Canadian health care institutions spend $4 billion on food services annually. However, health care food services are often seen as ancillary and largely disconnected from patient care outcomes. Correspondingly, despite the good intentions of clinicians, dieticians, and food service staff, much of the patient tray is left uneaten and thrown out, representing an enormous amount of food waste and inefficient spending.
The impact of this goes beyond waste management: the scientific team at Project Drawdown identifies reduced food waste and shifting to plant-rich as two of the most powerful interventions to curb climate change.
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What's growing in the Burnaby Hospital redevelopment office garden | |
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Tomatoes, basil and kale are just some of the plants and vegetables being grown on the Burnaby Hospital redevelopment project office terrace.
The project team’s food garden was developed after Florrie Levine, senior leader, Design and Construction, was awarded funding as one of the recipients of Fraser Health’s 2022 Innovation Grants under the Environment and Sustainability category.
The Innovation Grant gives Fraser Health innovators an opportunity to turn ideas into reality. The office food garden was based on Florrie’s vision to support planetary health.
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EV charging and carbon credits: How B.C. got it right and the federal government got it wrong
Electric Autonomy
There are now two different EV charging carbon credit programs in Canada: the federal program and provincial British Columbia program. Both permit electric vehicle charging stations to generate carbon credits that may be sold in a public market.
The idea is to increase the return on investment (ROI) for an organisation deciding to invest in EV charging. In turn, this incentivizes the installation of new charging stations or other green energy alternatives across the province and the country.
But, unfortunately, that is where the similarities largely end. Under the current structure of the federal program, money from carbon credits is being funnelled in the wrong direction, into the hands of network operators rather than EV charging station investors.
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V2G from commercial fleet vehicles can drive Canada to a green future and the time to act is now
Electric Autonomy
Parts of Canada are facing an electricity capacity crunch and looming price surges from grid instability, inefficiency, or unsustainable generation practices.
Ontario is one of the recent leading examples of this as it faces the loss of much of its power generating baseload with the planned decommissioning of the Pickering nuclear plant.
To make up for that loss of power — especially during Ontario’s electricity peaks — the provincial government is considering a wide variety of mechanisms that could cause a 400 per cent increase in the emissions intensity of Ontario’s grid.
Luckily there is a huge potential opportunity for Ontario and the rest of Canada. What if a new electricity demand on the grid — electric vehicles — could be part of the solution to Canada’s electricity woes?
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EV incentives in Canada: How you can get back up to $10,000
SAVVY New Canadians
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If you’re buying a new electric or hybrid vehicle, you may be eligible to get up to $10,000 off the purchase cost of your vehicle.
Many provinces and territories provide incentives for purchasing a new electric vehicle, and on top of that, you may also get up to $5,000 back for the federal EV rebate.
Electric cars are not cheap, but they are great for the environment and may cost less in the long run. These EV incentives can help offset the upfront cost greatly.
Keep reading to learn about the EV rebates in Canada, including the federal program and EV rebates in certain provinces.
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Mobilizing a green-friendly organisation through initiatives large and small
Hospital News
For The Hospital for Sick Children (SickKids), no project, initiative or idea is too big or too small when it comes to sustainability.
How does SickKids continuously work to improve its standing as a socially and environmentally responsible organisation? By getting everybody involved and thinking about sustainability every day.
SickKids has an in-house “Green Team,” made up of more than 40 dedicated staff members, who come up with ways to motivate and engage their SickKids colleagues to be green-friendly.
One of their crowning achievements is a series of waste campaigns to raise awareness among staff on proper waste disposal and reduce the amount of waste generated.
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Virginia Hospital System Develops Reusable Gown that Eases Supply Chain and Environmental Impact Issues
APIC
The Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) shortages brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic proved to be an opportunity for a Virginia health system to not only address supply chain issues, but also to improve their environmental footprint.
By designing and producing a custom, reusable isolation gown, Inova Health System, based in the Washington D.C. suburbs, ensured adequate supply of their second-most used type of PPE, while also eliminating 213 tons of waste per year.
Before 2020, the five-hospital system used 3.1 million single-use, disposable gowns each year, amounting to about 213 tons of waste. When COVID hit, the gowns, along with other PPE, were in short supply.
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EVENTS, TRAINING AND WEBINARS | |
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Eat for our future
“I think food is a great angle to connect people to the topic of sustainability because we all eat,” explains Elaine Chu.
What we eat and how we eat hugely impacts the environment.
The food system contributes to over 30% of global greenhouse gas emissions. Inefficiencies within the system are a significant source of waste: one third of food produced globally — approximately, 1.3 billion tons of food — is wasted every year. Our individual and collective food choices can directly improve planetary health.
Three ways to eat for wellness and planetary health:
1) Incorporate more plant-based foods into our diets
2) Reduce waste
3) Eat local and in season
Join BC GreenCare on November 30th at 12pm PST to learn more about how to reduce waste and make more sustainable food choices.
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Presentation of findings - 2022 Sustainable Schools research projects webinar
Join the Climate Change Network to hear the results of the two cohort research projects that our Sustainable Schools team conducted in 2022! Both projects are producing guides which all school boards can use to improve energy efficiency when replacing rooftop HVAC units and making operational improvements to their facilities.
On December 6, they will be presenting the in-depth analysis of 24 schools, examining causes of large energy use increases and savings to develop best practice guidance for operations, maintenance, metering and management practices which can achieve and sustain performance improvements over time.
REGISTER HERE
On December 8, they will present best practice guidance for design, equipment selection, commissioning and controls of rooftop unit replacements based on our examination of post-retrofit performance of recent projects at 10 schools across Ontario.
REGISTER HERE
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CFMS HEART intersectional environmentalism speaker series: Event #2 Register
Join us to discuss how the climate crisis intersects with other social and systemic determinants of health for Indigenous communities in the North, and the role of community engagement, Indigenous knowledge and multidisciplinary collaboration in advancing health equity.
The event will take place on Saturday, November 26, 2022 from 12-1:30 pm EST via Zoom. All registered attendees will be entered to win a copy of The Right to Be Cold: One Woman's Story of Protecting Her Culture, the Arctic and the Whole Planet, by Sheila Watt-Cloutier.
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Transitioning to new health care futures
How can we support food and health systems to break free from unhelpful patterns and find new ones that can be sustained long-term? Nourish is pleased to partner with Professor Terry Irwin and Dr. Gideon Kossoff from the Transition Design Institute at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, who will take us to the cutting edge of systems change theory and practice, sharing their insights on what it takes to actually shift systems toward better outcomes. Applying a Transition Design approach, together we’ll explore what it takes to get to better food in health care. For good.
WHEN: Wednesday, November 30, 12:00 - 1:30pm ET
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RETScreen® is a Clean Energy Management Software system for energy efficiency, renewable energy and cogeneration project feasibility analysis as well as ongoing energy performance analysis.
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Have you registered as an organ donor?
Contact your local organ donation agency and speak to your family about your wishes. You have the power to save and transform lives.
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The Canadian Coalition for Green Health Care is Canada’s premier green health care resource network, leading the evolution of green in Canada’s health sector as a national voice and catalyst for environmental change. www.greenhealthcare.ca | |
Some articles referred to in the Digest make reference to services and/or product offerings from specific suppliers. The CCGHC recommends that readers research the service and product offerings available through a wider range of suppliers for comparison purposes and in keeping with public sector purchasing guidelines. These articles should not be interpreted as an endorsement of any product or service. | | | | | |
