The SKAN Factor -- Rush University Medical Center

RUSH UNIVERSITY MEDICAL CENTER
(http://www.rush.edu)

Background

$1BIL Revenue
613 Beds plus Johnson R Bowman Health Center (61) and Rush Oak Park Hospital
982 Medical Staff
1039 Professional Nurses
636 Residents and fellows
8057 Employees
Over 18,000 in and out-patient surgeries
Over 45,000 out patients
Admits over 30,000 per year (4500 at Rush Oak Park)
2006: Total community benefits and services funds $155,223,142
           Philanthropic Support $64,200,000.
           Research Awards $60,000,000. 
           Has a $300,000,000 Campaign goal for 2012   

Noteworthy Information
Rush University Medical Center is a nonprofit organization with an acute care hospital serving adults and children. The center also includes The Johnston R. Bowman Health Center which serves the elderly and rehabilitation patients. Rush University is home to one of the first medical colleges in the Midwest, dating back to 1837, and has one of the nation’s top-ranked nursing colleges, as well as graduate programs in health systems management, allied health and biomedical research. The Medical Center also offers more than 70 highly selective residency and fellow¬ship programs in medical and surgical special¬ties and subspecialties.  10,000 physicians received their training at Rush Medical College.
Since its founding nearly 170 years ago, Rush has been a national leader in academic medicine. In 2007, Rush was named a “Top-Performing Hospital” by University Health System Consortium (UHC), an alliance of 97 academic medical centers, which placed Rush among the top five medical centers in the nation for the third year in a row. And in the July 2007 U.S.News & World Report, Rush was ranked in more specialties than any other hospital in Illinois.
Rush University is the academic component of Rush University Medical Center. Founded in 1972, the University has expanded from one college and fewer than 100 students to four colleges and over 1,500 students. It includes Rush Medical College, the College of Nursing, the College of Health Sciences, and The Graduate College.

Reported Sustainability Initiatives

• Seeking LEED certification for new facilities;
• Rush Remedy, a grassroots movement, was created by medical students at Rush University Medical Center because they believe medical supply recovery and recycling not only helps the environment, but also helps those in need in other developing countries while significantly reducing hospital costs.  With full support from the Rush Community Services Initiative Program, which is an umbrella for several student-led outreach programs designed to address the social and health care needs of residents in neighboring communities, the students who run Rush Remedy have collected 12,000 pounds of unused medical supplies since January which would otherwise end up in landfill (worth over 200 Million dollars).
• In May, 2008 Rush Oak Park Hospital was honored for its commitment to eliminating mercury and reducing waste and pollution, underscoring efforts to create a healthier environment for patients, staff and the community. The Hospital was one of 50 facilities nationwide to receive the “Partner for Change” award from the Practice Green Health Environmental Excellence Awards in Pittsburgh. The award was presented to facilities that demonstrated that they were working to improve and expand on programs to get rid of mercury, reduce waste and prevent pollution.
• Employee training is provided by the staff and vendors to further cut waste reduction and promote recycling. By arranging to have waste hauled only when the trash compactor is full, the Hospital has reduced pickups by two to three a month. It recycles cardboard and is testing a cardboard bailer for further waste reduction
• The hospital has switched to energy-efficient light bulbs. 
• The hospital uses all environmentally safe green cleaning products throughout on floors, bathrooms and carpets
• The Office of Research Integrity and Regulatory Affairs (ORIRA) at Rush University Medical Center promotes the highest ethical standards in achieving institutional and research goals complying with federal and state laws through their EQuIP (Evaluation Quality Improvement Program) assessing conscious adherence, compliance and progress
• The Rush Community Service Initiatives Program (RCSIP) helps create a network of ongoing community service programs in which Rush medical students volunteer with attending physicians from Rush.  Although student participation in RCSIP is strictly voluntary, and students do not receive academic credit for the involvement, approximately 90 percent of Rush Medical College students volunteer in one or more activities.  The hope is that students exposed to such diverse populations and settings will become more culturally competent as providers, which will serve them well as future physicians.
• Financial counselors provide information regarding Charity Care, Limited Income Program, Self Pay Discounts and Payment Plans
• Many free information resources available to the public, i.e. Library of Rush, Anne Waud Center for Healthy Aging, Cancer Wellness Center, McCormick Education Tech Center specializing in free Alzheimer information for the caregivers.

Summary

Stunningly, healthcare facilities expend about 2x as much energy per square foot than do commercial buildings.  What's more, hospitals themselves generate more than 2 million tons of solid waste per year -- roughly 15 pounds per patient each day.  Rounding out this list of happiness is that hospitals are the 4th largest source of mercury discharge into the environment.  Accordingly, we'd like to think that the healthcare industry would have been first to respond to calls for environmental initiatives designed to increase energy efficiencies and reduce waste.  This has simply not been the case.  Hopefully, a major paradigm shift is about to occur -- or in Rush's case, may already be occurring.

While most of the industry has been slow to respond, Rush appears to be well out of the gates and running now.  And while we see many healthcare institutions undertaking a variety of socially oriented missions around their communities, Rush seems to have embraced the more modern movement of connecting community involvement with true causes that empower people to make a difference.  In this case, the Rush Remedy program not only answers a call to reduce waste and provide well needed medical supplies to people in need, it also empowers the Rush medical students to develop their own initiatives and participate in this very meaningful cause.  Especially in healthcare, going beyond the daily expected job duties is something that we don't always see.  Social responsibility is a necessary component of sustainability and initiatives that connect the products and services to employees and communities is now the norm, even more so where these programs engage employees and other stakeholders to become directly involved.  To this end, the Rush programs have scored big points.

On the environmental front, Rush's commitment to reducing mercury waste garners much credit as well, as does their use of green cleaning products and energy efficient lightbulbs, though these actions are now the norm and should be expected.  Construction of new facilities, though, is tougher to score.  Existing construction may have been designed before most people knew about these standards and we're not sure what, if any, retrofits have been attempted during the process.  Further, though they recently announced approval for yet another structure and have indicated that it will seek LEED certification, the genuineness of this commitment will not be known until we see the final plans and whether the Hospital will seek a Gold/Platinum rating or will rest on the lesser effective general certification.  We also haven't seen any specific initiatives -- other than the aforementioned shift in light bulbs -- to a institution-wide reduction in energy consumption, renewable energy sourcing, water management, or waste initiatives other than the mercury programs discussed above.  The USGBC and the Green Guide for Healthcare have promulgated new standards for the design and operation of healthcare facilities and it will be nice to see Rush continue their trend towards environmental stewardship and social responsibility by embracing and adopting these standards, while continuing to empower employees and patients with a new level of consciousness towards these initiatives in the healthcare industry (including, perhaps, a patient education initiative on everything from unused drug disposal that otherwise contaminates water supplies to healthier patient-side products for more effective home healing and recovery).

The SKAN Factor Sustainability Rating: <.   > (Scale: 0.00 - 1.00)
Upward Trend

Comments

[diabetes supplies]

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-Luigi