Nobody likes a dirty hospital. It is the fantasy of every patient to be greeted by a smiling nurse in crisp uniform, then whisked away to a private room of glowing white, and gently placed in a bed of gleaming chrome and spotless, comfortable sheets. This hygiene, however, comes at a price.

Hospitals pollute in their effort to help the patient. Chemical toxins can be found in everything from cleaning products to radiology equipment. Overwhelming energy is consumed by running essential life saving machinery 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and medical waste is an inevitable by-product of our current health care system. But does good for the patient have to mean bad for the planet? Hospitals across the country are beginning to adjust their practices as they recognize the patient-care and fiscal benefits of ending their polluting ways.

Sadly, it’s not so easy being green when lives are at stake. In seeking change without sacrificing quality of care, hospitals face nearly insurmountable odds in their bid to reduce their environmental footprint. Unlike most businesses, whose bottom lines focus on profit, the medical industry sets the health of patients as top priority. That gives the health providers less flexibility, because any changes to practices must involve no health-related drawbacks. Whether it’s maintaining a sterile environment without the use of potentially dangerous chemicals or building safer, more energy-efficient facilities, hospitals need to be cautious with their green efforts. On top of this, they must do so within the confines of a highly regulated industry, contending daily with government groups, private sector oversight agencies, and policies that, while well intentioned, sometimes stand in direct opposition to the needs of both the hospital and its patients.

Cleaning Up the Clean Up

Every day, hospitals must deal with the irony that the products used to maintain an all-important sterile facility are often as dangerous as the germs they eradicate. When it comes to chemicals, less is often more, and there is no question that reducing toxic ingredients in any area will promote a stronger healing environment. For a hospital in particular, using fewer toxic-cleaning products reduces the stress on everyone, from patients to visitors to employees, while improving overall safety and making for a more health efficient facility.

Bye Bye Mercury

In recent years, most hospitals have made significant progress in eliminating once prevalent mercury from their facilities. Both versatile and dangerous, mercury plays an important role in all sorts of clinical devices, from thermometers to thermostats. While mercury’s usefulness is beyond question, it is also a powerful neurotoxin with the potential to affect the brain, spinal cord, and major organs. That’s why hospitals throughout the U.S. are replacing mercury-containing devices, sometimes at significant expense.

We Never Close

Medical emergencies don’t follow a schedule. Between the constant demand for 24-hour ER services and round-the-clock monitoring of admitted patients, hospitals are one of the few places where the lights are kept on all day, every day. As a result, hospitals in the United States use 836 trillion BTUs of energy yearly (over 2.5 times the energy intensity and CO2 emissions of commercial office buildings), while producing 28.575 million tons of CO2 and over 30 pounds of CO2 emissions per square foot on an annual basis. To make matters worse, emergency room admissions continue to rise as the number of uninsured climbs higher, forcing the trend in the wrong direction.

One thing is for certain: lights in hospitals are a necessity. So, what can be done to reduce the burden? For starters, the transition from incandescent lamps to fluorescent lamps reduces energy consumption and ensures a longer usage time, benefiting both the environment and the hospital’s bottom line. But even such a seemingly simple act of progress comes with strings attached, for if not disposed of properly, fluorescent lamps may release mercury (yes, mercury again) into the air, water and soil.

Regulations

For the medical industry as a whole, improving sustainability and reducing its environmental impact is not only the right ethical move, it is often mandated at the federal, state, and local levels.

And yet, rather than providing incentives for streamlining their functional models, many in health care services see the current blanket of government regulations as an active deterrent whose core goals stand in direct opposition to sustainable green progress. In fact, many of the suggested green practices currently in place may actually compromise patient care. While fresh air is free, it does not bode well in an operating room, especially in eliminating hospital-acquired infections. It’s also hard to reconcile the “green” goal of water conservation with the need for a surgeon to scrub for several minutes before operating.

Overall, it is in a hospital’s best interest to clean up its environmental footprint, no matter how difficult competing influences may make the process. Effectively pursuing the transition to a greener workplace is certainly possible, despite the initial cost, risk, and inconvenience, and may add to greater efficiency and savings down the line. Still, the distinctions – and even contradictions – put upon health care by local, state and federal laws place hospitals again at an unpleasant but somewhat familiar crossroads of contrasting policies. The challenge to make health care green is long term and uphill, though its ultimate benefits are certainly worth the effort, especially when one considers that the only feasible alternative is closing our hospitals’ doors for good.