Cost-saving recycling efforts in our hospitals

An ongoing hospital recycling initiative is addressing the issue of patient care supplies being thrown away without being used. The effort has helped Loma Linda University Health save costs, lessen the pressure on supply chain issues, and make a difference in reducing unnecessary hospital waste being generated.

The program, currently operating at Loma Linda University Medical Center and Children’s Hospital, East Campus and Surgical Hospital, started when concerns arose about the practice of discarding unused supplies at the nursing unit. Supplies returned to Central Supply due to concerns with recycle use for another patient, particularly during the pandemic due to infection control. As a result, if a unit order two sizes of an item for a patient, they could not return the unused package.

“There was ambiguity in whether a supply crossed into the patient field or remained in a clean supply location,” said Josh Lund, assistant vice president for supply chain management. “Because of infection control issues, those supplies were thrown out.”

Because the issue occurs in all nursing units, Loma Linda University Medical Center’s Process Improvement team, directed by James Pappas, MD, began looking at eliminating waste and lowering costs. Interviewing frontline workers and trials across critical units let the Process Improvement team identify the existing issues and processes. Over time, that information led the team to develop strategies to handle supplies while lessening the need to discard still-useful items.

“Guided by the Epidemiology team, we helped teams establish viable boundaries for safety and infection control,” said Yolanda Arroyo, manager of process improvement for LLUH.

Financial investment to launch the program was minimal, and the team worked to change the process within the organization. Since the phased implementation began, Arroyo says that the average savings in supply returns has grown from $6,500 per month during the pandemic to more than $22,000 monthly, which projects to an annual savings of $185,000.

“Once the cost savings, environmental impact, and workflows were understood, people got on board relatively quickly,” Lund said.

Lund says the program continues to be a team effort across Central Service, Dispatch, and Nursing. Loma Linda University Health’s other hospitals will each begin participating in the effort.

Another LLUH sustainability project underway involves reprocessing disposable operating room instruments. By working with Stryker Sustainability, an FDA-approved vendor, Lund says that high-dollar devices can be reprocessed and reused several times before they are deemed unfit for patient use.

“Not only do we reduce our impact on landfills, but the reprocessed instruments also come at a significantly reduced cost from the original equipment manufacturer’s price,” Lund said.

Continuing support from physicians, clinical leaders, and frontline team members is vital to making these programs successful.

“These efforts require work and consistent monitoring,” Lund said. “Reprocessing is not something you just launch and expect to run smoothly. It takes collaboration across all teams.”