Operation clean care: A hospital’s journey towards sustainable medical waste reduction

2023 IHF Ashikaga-Nikken Excellence Award for Green Hospitals – Silver Winner

Overview

The scale of response needed at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic pushed medical waste to surge in many hospitals.

At Mediclinic Welcare Hospital and its satellite clinics in Dubai (UAE), there was a 48% increase in waste costs from October 2020 to January 2021.

Mediclinic Welcare Hospital implemented a medical waste reduction project. Through improved segregation, labelling, collection, storage, and transportation, the aim was to achieve a 5% reduction in waste costs within a year.

Challenges

The increased volume of medical waste strained the hospital's budget. It led to higher costs for waste collection, storage, and disposal.

The surge in medical waste raised concerns about the hospital’s environmental impact. It was vital to ensure proper waste disposal and to comply with environmental regulations to prevent water contamination and minimize soil and air pollution.

The larger volume of waste posed risks to the health and safety of patients, the workforce, and the community.

Solution

The hospital launched a project to streamline waste management processes and identify cost-saving opportunities.

Quarterly rolling targets and regular monitoring were put in place to keep the hospital on track. And departments were tasked with taking responsibility for waste management within their areas.

Management raised awareness about the project in campaigns, encouraged strong participation through friendly competition among workers, and adopted new machines for accurate weighing of waste.

Impact

Mediclinic Welcare Hospital was able to significantly bring down medical waste costs from 99,000 AED to around 42,000 AED.

Individual departments were able to reduce waste, including surgery, emergency, outpatient and inpatient departments.

Waste in operating theatres decreased from 8.5 kg to 4.25 kg per surgery. Waste in the emergency department and the outpatient department was reduced from 0.25 kg to 0.12 kg and 0.1 kg to 0.03 kg per patient visit respectively. And waste per patient day in inpatient settings significantly decreased from 21.27 kg to 2.29 kg.

Written by:

Katherine Bennett