This month has brought warm weather and cool sustainability initiatives!

This edition includes updates on:

• The Maryland Health Care Sustainability Leadership Council
• UMMC’s Trailblazer Education Event: Energy Conservation – March 1
• Eco Hospital Jeopardy!
• Hospital Earth Day Activities
• MedStar Harbor Hospital’s Fresh Start on Recycling
• MedStar’s System-Wide Environmental Leadership Council
• Civista Medical Center’s Green Team Webpage
• Kaiser Permanente Purchasing PVC- and DEHP-free IV bags
• Chemotherapy Drugs Put Nurses at Doubled Risk for Miscarriage
• Nursing Updates
• Pharmaceutical Waste Updates
• Sustainable Food Updates
• And much, MUCH more!

Enjoy, and please let us know what’s going green at your facility!

Best,

The MD H2E Team

Looking for a low-cost, high yield green program for your hospital, which will benefit patients and staff alike? Come to University of Maryland Medical Center for a FREE event on March 1^st to learn easy changes you can make!

Trailblazer Education Series

ENERGY CONSERVATION

University of Maryland Medical Center with BGE—March 1st, 9-11 am

The green initiatives started by hospitals not only reduce our impact on the planet – they can cut costs, create goodwill with the community, and improve employee health and morale!

Which is exactly what University of Maryland Medical Center has done. Last year UMMC made a thorough assessment of its lighting needs and made comprehensive changes:

Turn off lights when not in use, use daylight when it’s sufficient, replace inefficient light bulbs with more efficient ones, install occupancy sensors and photo cell sensors, and establish a baseline to monitor changes. UMMC listened to nurses and implemented a quiet/low light time on patient floors! 

Learn from UMMC staff on programmatic issues and hear from Baltimore Gas & Electric on available grants and rebates to implement energy conservation programs.

To learn more, go to http://mdh2e.org/awards-recognition/2011-trailblazer-awards/

To register for this FREE event, please send your name, title, facility name, e-mail, and phone to Englund@son.umaryland.edu. Please RSVP by February 24^th.

Attendance is open to all. However, priority will be given to hospital and health care employees when limitations occur.

“A roof farm is a type of green roof. A green roof is a system of layers that is laid over an existing roof. A green roof is beneficial to a building owner and the community because it protects the existing roof, doubling to tripling its life, thereby saving money and keeping materials out of the landfill. Green roofs also reduce a building’s energy costs by insulating in the winter and cooling the rooftop in the summer. Combine these benefits with green roofs’ ability to temper the effects of two common urban environmental problems – combined sewer overflow and the urban heat island effect – and you have a waste-eliminating, resource-protecting, CO2-reducing, food-producing powerhouse of a concept.”

For more:

http://www.sustainablebusinessleader.org/roof-agriculture-%E2%80%93-old-concept-comes-boston-a-new-form

A simple program involving color-coded food labeling and adjusting the way food items are positioned in display cases was successful in encouraging more healthful food choices in a large hospital cafeteria.  The report from Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) researchers will appear in the March American Journal of Public Health and has received early online release.

“We found that labeling all foods and beverages with a simple red, yellow and green color scheme to indicate their relative healthiness led patrons to purchase more of the healthy and fewer of the unhealthy items,” says Anne Thorndike, MD, MPH, of the MGH division of General Medicine, who led the study.  “We also found that moving items around to make the healthy items more convenient and visible led to further improvement in the nutritional quality of items purchased.”

The study authors note that most current point-of-purchase efforts to encourage more healthful food choices focus on labeling the calorie content of food, which will soon be required for many restaurants and food service vendors as part of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. However, calorie information is only useful if people read and comprehend it – which requires understanding their own calorie needs, accurately estimating serving sizes, and having enough time to consider and act on the information provided.  Studies by psychologists and behavioral economists also have noted that individuals tend to maintain their typical behavior patterns and are more motivated by actions with immediate, rather than long-term rewards.

For more: http://www.massgeneral.org/about/pressrelease.aspx?id=1431

This newsletter contains the stories and pictures that were touched on in last week’s press release by MD H2E about the hospitals that served local and sustainable foods in 2011, particularly during the Buy Local Challenge.

Also, here is the media coverage that the press release received over the past week:

The Baltimore Sun (blog)     -   MD hospitals shopping locally for food

NPR (blog & health news)      -   Not Your Grandmother’s Hospital Food

Health Leaders Media        -   MD hospitals shopping locally for food

Sustainable Food News     -   Mid-Atlantic hospitals boost local, sustainable food sourcing

You have much to be proud of with the progress you are making in providing healthier foods to your patients, employees and community members!

We look forward to our continued work together with you in 2012.

“On the journey to sustainability, helping individuals and groups make the connection between their everyday activities and the possibilities that are ahead is imperative.”

Creating a Culture of Sustainability in Health Care

News Release

For Immediate Release: January 19, 2012

Contact:  Louise Mitchell

Phone:    443.257.3209

Lmitc001@son.umaryland.edu

 Hospitals Across the Region Increase

Local, Sustainable Food Purchases in 2011,
More Growth Predicted for 2012

Baltimore, MD:  Over 40 hospitals in Maryland, the District of Columbia, and Northern Virginia are now purchasing locally grown fruits and vegetables regularly during the growing season, and nine hospitals are now consistently purchasing meat or poultry produced by local farmers who use sustainable agricultural practices. According to Louise Mitchell, sustainable foods program manager of Maryland Hospitals for a Healthy Environment (MD H2E), the result has been healthier hospital food, increased financial viability for local farmers and the local economy, and a healthier environment for local communities.

“Incorporating more local and sustainable foods requires a modification of the traditional purchasing practices of hospitals,” said Mitchell, also one of the regional organizers of Health Care Without Harm’s Healthy Food in Health Care Program. “Leading hospitals in this region deserve a lot of credit for their persistence, determination and strategic thinking on how to make it work.”

Campaigns such as the Buy Local Challenge and the “less meat, better meat” Balanced Menus Challenge by Health Care Without Harm (HCWH) offered hospitals opportunities to pilot new purchasing initiatives. Forty hospitals spent nearly $30,000 on local foods in one week during the Buy Local Challenge in July 2011, twice the amount purchased during the same week in 2010 and translating to at least $60,000 of positive impact on the local economy.  Highest purchases for the week included Union Hospital of Cecil County at $5,482, Meritus Medical Center at $2,187 and Civista Medical Center at $1,841. And while most hospitals focused their purchases on local fruits and vegetables, nine hospitals launched or increased the more complex process of purchasing meat or poultry produced by local farmers using sustainable agricultural practices and three others piloted such programs, the focus of the Balanced Menus Challenge.  HCWH defines sustainable agricultural practices for meat and poultry as being raised, at a minimum, without the routine use of antibiotics, without arsenic additives or added growth hormones, and ideally, raised outside on pasture.

“We served local pasture-raised beef from Quiet Meadow Farm in our cafeteria as a pilot project and received rave reviews from our employees.  They loved the quality and the taste,” said Rick Haefner, Food and Nutrition Service Director at Calvert Memorial Hospital in Prince Frederick, Maryland.  “We are now exploring ways to add this beef to our menu more regularly in 2012.”
Hospitals like Calvert Memorial are implementing best practices and cost-saving strategies used by leading institutions, which were highlighted at events and trainings held by MD H2E last year. A day-long conference last May entitled “Local Sustainable Meat & Poultry – Making the Shift in Institutional Purchasing” featured food service directors from hospitals, schools and universities in this region and around the country sharing their successful local sustainable meat and poultry purchasing programs.

The Chefs and Cooks Training last October shared both the “why” and the “how” of working with local, sustainable meat and poultry, which often includes revising patient and cafeteria menus to reduce the total amount of meat and use less familiar cuts of meat in order to manage costs.   “We’re seeing a growing demand from our employees, medical residents, students, and visitors for these local grass-fed meats produced without antibiotics and other additives,” said Tiffany Hightower, operations manager of the food and nutrition services department at George Washington University Hospital.  “We learned many useful strategies at the Chefs and Cooks Training last Fall and we’re starting to take steps to integrate them into our menus.”

Hospitals’ Efforts Are Aided by Developments Throughout the Local Food System

At the same time, the growth of local food purchasing by hospitals has also been facilitated by changes in other segments of the local food system and by resources provided by other critical players in the food chain, laying the groundwork for greater advances in local sustainable meat and poultry purchasing by hospitals in 2012:

• Distributors now carry sustainable meat and poultry raised by local producers
• Quality improvement and group purchasing organization Premier healthcare alliance now has Murray’s Chicken, raised in Pennsylvania without antibiotics or arsenic additives, available to their member hospitals around the country
• The Maryland Department of Agriculture launched a new food safety certification program that certifies small-scale Maryland farmers to process and sell their poultry directly to institutions
• Local meat processors expanded their processing capabilities, enabling more local farmers to process the higher volumes of meat required by institutions
• The University of Maryland Extension Agricultural Marketing program developed a new factsheet, Farm-to-Hospital – Selling Farm-Raised Meats and Poultry in Maryland to guide local farmers in how to work with hospitals on purchasing their products
• Future Harvest-Chesapeake Alliance for Sustainable Agriculture featured the theme Farm to Institution: Making Local Food Economies a Reality at its recent annual conference.  It drew record-breaking numbers of over 400 people, including for the first time hospital dietitians, who earned continuing education credits for attending sessions that showed how sustainable food production methods lead to healthier foods

Hospital Efforts Recognized by State and National Organizations

Hospitals also received statewide and national recognition for their accomplishments.  Carroll Hospital Center received 1^st place in the national Food Climate Health Connection Award of the Healthy Food in Health Care program of Health Care Without Harm for reducing purchases of conventionally produced meat by 21 percent and reducing food service waste.  The hospital also increased its purchase of local sustainable meat and poultry for patients and cafeteria patrons.

Union Hospital of Cecil County received Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley’s first Smart, Green and Growing Buy Local Agricultural Challenge Award, the 2011 Maryland Outstanding Rural Health Achievement Award, and the 2011 Trailblazer Award by MD H2E for reaching significant procurement benchmarks including 100 percent local pasture-raised beef, 90 percent local pasture-raised poultry, 9 percent certified organic produce, and other local produce and dairy purchases, bringing their total rate of local food purchasing to 44% of their meat, poultry, produce and dairy.

“Maryland hospitals are demonstrating true leadership,” said Michelle Gottlieb, national coordinator of the Healthy Food in Health Care Program of HCWH. “They are not only protecting the health of their patients, employees, communities and the environments where they live, they are also supporting local farmers and sending a strong message to the marketplace – as a result, they are changing our food system,” said Gottlieb.

Twelve hospitals purchased local sustainable meat and poultry in 2011:

Forty hospitals purchased local foods during the 2011 Buy Local Challenge:

Additional resources including pictures and stories of hospitals’ local food programs, links to the Buy Local Challenge and Balanced Menus Challenge, presentations and reporting from the Local Sustainable Meat & Poultry conference and the Chefs and Cooks Training, factsheets and other information are available at http://mdh2e.org/sustainable-foods/.

 Maryland Hospitals for a Healthy Environment (MD H2E) is a technical assistance and networking initiative of the University of Maryland School of Nursing that promotes environmental sustainability in health care including pollution prevention, waste reduction, environmentally preferable purchasing, green building, and sustainable food practices. Participants include hospitals, clinics, nursing homes, research laboratories, and other ancillary health care provider in Maryland. www.mdh2e.org.

The Healthy Food in Health Care Program is a national initiative of Health Care Without Harm, developed in conjunction with its member organizations, which mobilizes advocates to work with hospitals across the country to help improve the sustainability of their food services. For more information about the HCWH Healthy Food in Health Care Program, visit www.healthyfoodinhealthcare.org.

 Heath Care Without Harm (HCWH), an international coalition of more than 500 organizations in 53 countries, is working to transform the health care sector, without compromising patient safety or care, so that it is ecologically sustainable and no longer a source of harm to public health and the environment. To learn more about HCWH’s work, visit our website at www.noharm.org, our YouTube channel at HCwithoutharm, and our twitter feed at hcwithoutharm.

# # #

In this edition, find:

• The MD H2E Trailblazer Event Dates Announced
• Interview with Colleen Cusick, Chair of the Maryland Health Care Sustainability Leadership Council
• The Greener GBMC Dining Room
• Good Samaritan’s Grown for Good Garden Project
• Updates from Union Memorial, Anne Arundel Medical Center, and Carroll Hospital Center
• Sustainable Food Updates – Farm to Institution Conference, Chefs and Cooks Training, and More
• Nurses Taking Action
• And More!

Enjoy, and please let us know what’s going green at your facility!

*Correction: On page 5 of the newsletter, Union Memorial Hospital is erroneously listed as participating in the Chefs and Cooks Training. It was Union Hospital of Cecil County, whose Chef William Morgan is pictured and participated as a chef instructor for the event.

Gould quotes Beckwith as saying, “It’s the right thing to do for our environment, for our patients, and for our employees. Fresh and local is healthier.”

MD H2E’s own Sustainable Food Program Manager, Louise Mitchell, was also interviewed. Mitchell says, “Hospitals are starting to realize the changes that have happened in our food system…And there are lots of practices that are linked to chronic disease and obesity. Hospitals have realized that they have a responsibility to change their food purchasing practices.”

An interesting story – give it a listen!

http://wamu.org/news/11/12/31/area_hospitals_strive_for_healthier_locally_grown_food