Strengthen and Grow Your Practice Using Green Initiatives
Inventory and Supplies:
 Choose supplies and products with minimal packaging. Syringes can come in hard or soft
plastic wrapper.
 Consider the source of your products. Can locally sourced products work? Is the
manufacturing facility environmentally sustainable designed?
 Avoid excessive use of your air conditioner. Certainly 65 F can’t be good for a recovering
surgery patient?
 Eco-friendly general cleaning and odor control products - dish soap, sink cleaner, toilet
cleaner, glass cleaner, laundry soap, etc.
 Eco-friendly alternative to formaldehyde.
 For those that have RO or spring water delivered, some water companies also have distilled
water available in five gallon reusable containers.
 Many medical supplies such as cautery wands or syringe packaging can be recycled.
 Use eco friendly office products.
Human Resources:
 Bonding is a simple reason to Green your practice. Either formally or informally, people like
to bond with other individuals, groups or teams. People like to be able to share a connection
with others. The success of Face book, MySpace, Twitter and other sites are proof of this.
 A great team building exercise for your staff is to brainstorm how your hospital can become
greener. This exercise will also highlight which of your staff will make an ideal Green
Advocate for your hospital.
 Highlight your hospital as a green work environment or an environmentally friendly setting
to attract staff that have similar values. Strong team environments and groups with strong
bonds and shared values have lower turnover rates.
 Keep a hospital copy of Al Gore's - An Inconvenient Truth DVD, loan it out to your staff and
their friends…and just for fun…ask them to sign the cover before they return it.
Marketing:
 You’re sending a message that you care. It’s easy for clients to make the connection between
you caring for the environment and you caring for their pet.
 Provide eco-friendly pet ownership guidelines for your clients.
 Offer to accept food bags for recycling.
 Use biodegradable stool bags
 Establish recycling blue boxes in the staff room and all other rooms where recyclable waste is
generated.
 Set up a departmental waste collection schedule, depending on generation to ensure your
hospital remains tidy and clean. For example, have the soft plastic (i.e., IV bags, wrappers)
collection container emptied four times daily in the Treatment Room. Disinfect blue boxes
(bottles and cans) whenever they are emptied…and keep them in the Lunch Room, where the
waste is generated
 Market your green activities on your Web site as many of your clients will like to see this.
 Green Burial is an option in some areas.
 Consider eco-friendly marketing products. Insulated coffee mugs, reusable water bottles and
shopping bags. These items are designed for repeated reuse, thus, your hospital has multiple
exposures. Pens are available that are made of eco-friendly corn starch, that are highly
recyclable or made of recycled products
Practice Organization/Building:
 Electronic medical records mean little or no paper! If your stubborn or technology challenged
Dr. has concerns about going paperless, then find a technology savvy veterinarian that is ten
years older than s/he is and arrange a tour of their hospital.
 Use tablet laptops for consent forms.
 E-mail reminders.
 Digital radiology eliminates chemical and film waste.
 Using an alternative power company – wind or solar, instead of getting power from main
grid. In Canada, you can use Bullfrog Power, an energy reseller that purchases electricity from
solar, wind and friendly hydro producers, so you can power your location without a huge
capital cost.
 Talk to your IT dept and have faxes diverted electronically and receive as e-mails.
 Stop printing reports that you don’t need in paper. All hospital software easily creates reports
into PDF or Word files.
 Solar power is successfully used in hospitals across the country.
 Speak up…if you lease your hospital space, ask the building owner for recycling facilities.
Contact your local politicians’ office, city hall or municipal office and voice your interest in
recycling and environmental issues. While you’re at it, make sure your region is not sending
its waste overseas for processing.
 Many municipalities have special programs for local businesses to upgrade lighting,
programmable thermostats and such. Others will also certify a business as a Green Business.
 High efficiency appliances such as front load washer and dryer use 1/5th the water and ½ the
electricity compared to top loaders. They also use significantly less detergent
 T8 fluorescent lighting.
 Lights off in rooms not being used during the day and at night. Use led night lights if needed
in wards. Motion detectors that replace light switches are readily available and they are so
cool.
 Use window coverings that block heat but allow light to come in.
 Tankless or solar hot water heaters.