The White House Council on Environmental Quality recently hosted the Healthier Hospitals Initiative for a discussion celebrating the healthcare industry’s innovative success in adopting more sustainable practices. The event, “Greening America’s Hospitals,” specifically highlighted HHI’s successful efforts to reduce the environmental footprint of hospitals, lower costs and improve patient health by incorporating environmental sustainability initiatives into business models.
In addition to HHI and CEQ, senior administration officials, hospital administrators, business leaders and policy experts lent perspectives to the discussion. The discussion included two panels, “Fostering a Culture of Environmental Sustainability” and “Healthier Hospitals Initiative: Transforming the Supply Chain.” The panelists included:
- Gary Cohen, president, Health Care Without Harm, and founder of the Healthier Hospitals Initiative
- Kathy Gerwig, vice president, Workplace Safety and environmental stewardship officer, Kaiser Permanente
- Al Iannuzzi, senior director of product stewardship, Worldwide Environment, Health and Safety at Johnson & Johnson
- John Messervy, AIA, director of capital and facilities planning, Partners HealthCare
- Brad Perkins, M.D., executive vice president for strategy & innovation, & chief transformation officer, Vanguard Health Systems
- Blair Sadler, senior fellow, Institute for Healthcare Improvement; former CEO of Rady Children’s HospitalJ. Knox Singleton, CEO, Inova Health System
- Jeff Thompson, M.D., CEO, Gundersen Health System
- Christina Vernon, executive sustainability officer, Cleveland Clinic
- Seema Wadhwa, director, Healthier Hospitals Initiative
Several senior officials of the Obama Administration were on hand to spotlight HHI’s effective approaches to implementing sustainability initiatives that reduce costs and improve patient care in healthcare facilities across the country.
For more information, visit www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2012/07/24/promoting-sustainable-health-care.
