Hospitals do their part to heal the Earth

By Wendy Soderburg

Across campus, the green movement to lessen our impact on the environment is advancing on every front — from residence halls to restaurants.

No less so than on the south end of the campus, where a very large component of UCLA’s green machinery has been quietly but effectively churning along for about a dozen years.

UCLA Health System — comprised of UCLA Medical Center, Santa Monica-UCLA Medical Center and Orthopaedic Hospital, Resnick Neuropsychiatric Hospital and Mattel Children’s Hospital — entered the green arena about 12 years ago when it eliminated the use of ethylene oxide and glutaraldehyde, two highly toxic sterilizing agents, and replaced them with sterilants such as CIDEX OPA (ortho-phthalaldehyde). Once neutralized, CIDEX OPA can legally and harmlessly be flushed down the drain.

That’s just one of the many ways UCLA Health System is reducing its impact on the environment, said Victor Kennedy, director of the UCLA Health System Safety Department. Another is the elimination of mercury-based thermometers, which have been replaced by temperature strips and electronic thermometers. Sphygmomanometers (blood pressure cuffs) now use oil instead of mercury, and Hurst dilators — used to dilate the esophagus when the opening has narrowed — contain more environmentally friendly tungsten.

Recently, campus laboratories were notified by Michael Spicer, manager of Environment, Health & Safety’s Hazardous Materials Program, of a new Mercury Thermometer Exchange Program. “This is a free service that we have started in efforts to make UCLA a mercury-free campus,” Spicer said.

UCLA no longer sends to the landfill sterilized biohazardous wastes such as the containers for “sharps” — used needles, blades, scalpels and syringes. Previously, these containers, filled with sharps, were either autoclaved (cleaned in a pressure cooker) or incinerated. Since they were now benign biologically, they went to the landfill, Kennedy said. “But our new vendor, Daniels Sharpsmart, has a process for reusing the sharps containers. So we’re estimating that we’ll keep about 20 tons of waste per year out of the landfills.”

UCLA has purchased recycling distillation equipment that is being used to recycle alcohol and other solvents in the clinical labs. And paper is also slowly being phased out as the hospitals turn to electronic records.

“We now have the capability to store X-rays electronically, so there’s less need for film,” Kennedy said. “In the new [Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center], there will be a mobile computer at every bedside, so the physician and nurse will not be writing on a chart. They will go into the patient’s chart on the computer and document everything right there.”

Cafeterias at the UCLA Medical Center and Santa Monica-UCLA Medical Center are also getting greener. Paper cups have already replaced Styrofoam ones. And the cooking oil used in cafeteria kitchens is being converted into bio-
diesel, thanks to a new company, “Greener Tomorrow.” Instead of a garbage disposal system, the kitchen in the new hospital will use a Somat Waste Reduction System. Food waste will first be pumped through the system, which extracts all the water and compacts the waste. This smaller amount of waste then goes to a designated bin.