Carilion Roanoke Memorial Hospital and Carilion New River Valley win national awards for environmental sustainability

Sustainability is at the heart of our healing mission – and we’re proud to share that our sustainability strategies have won us national awards for two of our hospitals. Carilion Roanoke Memorial Hospital and Carilion New River Valley both received the 2021 Environmental Excellence Award from Practice Greenhealth, the nation’s leading organization dedicated to environmental sustainability in health care.

This is the 5th consecutive year that CRMH has received this national recognition, and the 3rd consecutive year for CNRV!

In health care, sustainability means looking at how our operations affect the health and safety of our environment as well as the health of our patients, staff, visitors, and local community. Strategies to address sustainability at our organization include minimizing and recycling waste, lowering energy and water consumption, and sourcing food locally when we can. At Carilion Clinic, we know sustainability is essential to better care for our patients, communities, and planet.

In recent years, we have made great strides toward reducing our impact on the environment, and we are committed to doing even more. This year, as part of our larger applications, we highlighted some of the grass-roots initiatives from both facilities.  Including:

• Carilion Clinic New River Valley Medical Center became home to a bee apiary.  Daniel Kolasa, a radiographer at CNRV, applied for a grant from the Carilion Clinic Foundation to start the Bee Healthy Apiary on the grounds of the hospital. The apiary currently consists of two hives and a bear fence but has the potential to grow to three hives in the coming year. Daniel tends to the apiary every two weeks as well as offers tours to interested visitors.
• A Native Planting Day on the grounds of Roanoke Memorial Hospital.  An event coordinated by Dr. Jessica Fleming, a medical resident who has a passion and extensive knowledge of wildlife populations and their dependence on native plants to survive.  Our Sustainability Champions were able to plant native seeds in various areas of CRMH’s grounds which will not only support wildlife but will also beautify the grounds. We are looking forward to seeing what blooms!
• The Carilion Clinic drug donation program which allows individuals to donate unused and unopened medications to help those who are in need.  It is designed to offer an affordable, onsite option for patients that are otherwise financially unable to afford their current prescription medications with the added benefits of reducing medication waste as well as reducing the risk of improper prescription disposal which can lead to drugs leaching into local water systems. This program was born through the joint realization of the Carilion Medication Assistance Program and the Carilion Community Pharmacy that we need to do more to help provide better care for those that are experiencing financial hardships.

To learn more about our sustainability efforts, visit our intranet site (https://www.insidecarilion.org/hub/sustainability) or contact Sara Wohlford, Efficiency & Sustainability Manager (sewohlford@carilionclinic.org) or Marina Sotelo, Efficiency & Sustainability Coordinator (mcsotelo@carilionclinic.org).

We’re grateful to the many caregivers, frontline workers and administrators who are committed to this work and bring innovation, ingenuity, and adaptability to help us dramatically improve our footprint.

A very special thank you to Marina Sotelo, Efficiency & Sustainability Coordinator who diligently worked on these robust applications.  We appreciate you!