by Shane Henson — November 4, 2011—Hospital and medical clinic facilities managers charged with the responsibility of purchasing certain medical products can become better informed on how to secure those that are more sustainable through a tool offered by Practice Greenhealth, Standardized Environmental Questions for Medical Products. The Healthcare Supply Chain Association (HSCA) recently announced it has endorsed the tool, which can be used to guide the identification, selection and procurement of environmentally preferable medical products.
According to Practice Greenhealth, a source for environmental solutions for the healthcare sector, the tool is a significant part of its Greening the Supply Chain Initiative, which the organization launched earlier this year to provide a common set of tools for purchasers, suppliers and manufacturers to ensure that environmentally preferable products (EPP) are available, cost competitive, of comparable quality, and generate a sector-wide market shift in the direction of sound EPP practices.
The Practice Greenhealth tool is designed to serve as a template containing standardized questions on key environmentally preferable attributes of medical products that can be used by all stakeholders. Practice Greenhealth officials say the questions were selected with input from dozens of organizations representing various sectors of the healthcare industry, including hospitals, health systems, suppliers and GPOs.
The standardized questions will function as key considerations in purchasing practices to help meet several goals, including, but not limited to: providing the supply chain with a tool to identify key environmental attributes of concern to the healthcare sector; collaborating with the largest purchasers of medical products to accelerate demand for products with reduced environmental and human health impacts; and informing and educating the healthcare community.
