Legacy Hospitals' Waste Management

This article presented by Oregon Live is about what hospitals are doing to go green to counteract medical waste, especially Legacy hospitals in the Portland area. The article discusses how the Legacy Health Systems will install its new trash shredder and compactor. This machine will turn large amounts of waste into smaller shards, which will allow for better sterilization. The compacted sterile waste will then be sent to a landfill in Washington. It is estimated that the shredder and compactor will save Legacy $300,000 to $500,000 in disposal cost.

The article then goes on to discuss what Legacy Health Systems in Portland are currently doing in an effort to reduce waste and improve sustainability. Currently, Legacy donates unopened medical equipment to Medical Teams International. This equipment includes surgical tools, IV tubes, scissors, clamps and cleaning trays. The most waste typically comes from the operating rooms because surgical equipment often goes unused; if the seal for the entire pack is broken then individually wrapped items are considered waste. Due to these new efforts by Legacy to reduce waste, now these individually wrapped items can be donated instead of thrown out.

I found this article interesting because it involves corporate responsibility in the medical field within the Portland area. The part I found to be the most interesting is even though Legacy is making a large effort to be sustainable, lessen their waste and dispose of it properly, they are shipping it over to Washington. Legacy is making this effort, but then they send all of the waste to Washington where a whole new community must deal with their waste material. I appreciate the efforts by Legacy to be more conscious and sustainable, but it does not seem fair to dump this waste on to the people and wildlife of Washington. Hopefully, Legacy will continue to be sustainable and show corporate responsibility, but maybe with future innovations Legacy and other hospitals can further reduce waste and find more ways to recycle it.

http://www.oregonlive.com/environment/index.ssf/2010/10/as_medical_waste_mounts_hospit.html

Pat A.