Health pros take climate action to care for patients, planet
From new plant-leaning hospital menus to fewer surgical gloves and single-use syringes, health-care professionals are finding ways to combat waste and pollutants.
Dr. Wendy Levinson, chair of the eco-advocacy group Choosing Wisely Canada, said physicians are changing their practice to reduce the environmental impact of nearly everything from lab tests to medications.
“What’s new is that the health professionals are starting to say, ‘What can I do?’ “said Levinson, also a professor of medicine at the University of Toronto.
Her group has released 40 recommendations from doctors in various specialties encouraging individual and collective action against climate change, including scaling back on lab tests where possible and meeting virtually to avoid excessive travel.
Similar initiatives, big and small, are underway across the country.
A “planetary health” food pilot that recently wrapped at Vancouver General Hospital loaded patient menus with plant-based meals and “climateconscious proteins” including steelhead trout and turkey, said Dr. Annie Lalande, whose sixmonth project focused on hospital meals and food production.
The program introduced lunch and dinner options including coconut chicken curry, soy-based sloppy joes and a Korean-style gochujang bowl made with beans to incorporate sustainable and mostly locally sourced ingredients.
The recipes were developed with input from patients, and the program was recently extended to Richmond General Hospital south of Vancouver.
Lalande, who is doing a PhD in environment and sustainability at the University of British Columbia while completing her residency in surgery, said there are clear connections between human health and the environmental impacts of raising animals, especially cattle, for meat.
“People are understanding the role that food plays in both our health and the health of our planet. The main goal of the project was looking at it from a greenhouse gas emissions perspective,” she said.
“We’re trying to maintain choice for patients and we’re certainly not trying to turn everyone vegan,” said Lalande, adding that before the new menu was introduced, up to half the food on patients’ plates was left uneaten.
Sustainability efforts by Choosing Wisely Canada, which also involves Toronto’s St. Michael’s Hospital, have focused on reducing “low value” lab tests, treatments and procedures.
Family doctors, pharmacists and nearly two dozen societies of specialists made the 40 evidence-based recommendations released this week. It’s part of a campaign funded by the Canadian Medical Association Foundation, Health Canada and all provinces and territories except Quebec and Yukon. The former Quebec medical association contributes some funding.
The recommendations encourage doctors to order blood tests only as needed — instead of routinely scheduling them — to cut down on the use of single-use tubes and syringes. They also urge greater care in prescribing medications, noting antibiotics are often prescribed for viral infections despite evidence they do not work in those cases.