Awards Mark Best Programs in Sustainable Healthcare
PHOENIX– Practice Greenhealth, a membership association devoted to environmentally responsible healthcare, has announced its 2011 Environmental Excellence Award winners. These competitive awards are given within the healthcare sector to institutions for outstanding programs to reduce the facility’s environmental footprint.
St. Francis Hospital–Eastside, and St. Francis Hospital–Downtown, (Greenville, SC), of the Bon Secours St. Francis Health System, were recognized with Practice Greenhealth‘s highest award by being admitted to the Environmental Leadership Circle, which honors facilities that exemplify environmental excellence and are setting the highest standards for environmental practices in healthcare.
“All of our members are committed to improving health care’s environmental performance, but there is a particularly outstanding group of facilities setting the highest standards,” said Practice Greenhealth Executive Director Anna Gilmore Hall. “St. Francis Hospital–Eastside, and St. Francis Hospital–Downtown, have each introduced extensive environmental strategies into health care and are committed to achieving further improvements. Recipients of our top award, inducted into the Environmental Leadership Circle, they are the best of the best.”
In addition, eight major health systems, including Advocate Health Care, Oak Brook, IL; Bon Secours Health System, Inc., Marriotsville, MD; Catholic Healthcare West, San Francisco, CA; Cleveland Clinic Health System, Cleveland, OH; Covenant Health Systems, Tewksbury, MA; Fairview Health Services, Minneapolis, MN; Inova Health System, Falls Church, VA; and Spectrum Health, Grand Rapids, MI; received Practice Greenhealth’s System for Change award. This award recognizes health systems that are working cohesively to gather data, set system goals, benchmark, and share successes in environmental performance.
“We are very pleased to see so many leading health systems striving to improve their environmental performance,” stated Gilmore Hall. “Each of our Environmental Excellence Awards represents a tremendous effort on the part of hospital staff to reduce the health and environmental impacts associated with health delivery.”
A total of 252 awards were presented in eight categories. Again this year, through a partnership with Trees for the Future, Practice Greenhealth is honoring Environmental Excellence Awards winners with 100 trees per award planted in Tanzania, a collective total of more than 25,000 trees.
A complete list of Practice Greenhealth Environmental Excellence Award winners can be found at: www.practicegreenhealth.org/awards/winners/
About Practice Greenhealth
Practice Greenhealth is the nation’s leading membership and networking organization for institutions in the healthcare community that have made a commitment to sustainable, eco-friendly practices. Members include hospitals, healthcare systems, businesses and other stakeholders engaged in the greening of healthcare to improve the health of patients, staff and the environment. For more information on Practice Greenhealth, visit www.practicegreenhealth.org.
