Six surgical device and supply manufacturers have teamed with a pair of recycling and waste management companies in an effort to increase sustainability efforts across health care.

The Healthcare Plastics Recycling Council includes Cardinal Health, Hospira, BD, Johnson & Johnson, Kimberly-Clark, DuPont, Waste Management and Engineered Plastics.

Currently, the council is involved in 3 initiatives aimed at identifying and solving barriers to increased plastic recycling throughout the manufacturing chain. It hopes to assess how products are designed, used and disposed of with the aim of boosting production of recyclable healthcare plastics.

The council is also developing sustainability guidelines for product and packaging designs specific to healthcare applications in order to enhance the "recycling potential and value" of disposable devices and supplies.

It has already conducted several pilot studies, which have given it a better understanding of how plastics end up in the medical waste stream and how they can be transitioned into recyclable products. The council plans to use the studies' results to develop a national healthcare recycling system that is "economically viable and environmentally sound."

Catherine Zimmer, MS, BSMT, a healthcare specialist with the Minnesota Technical Assistance Program and operator of the Minneapolis consulting business Zimmer Environmental Improvement, says recycling at the point of care will help divert waste, but purchasing greener surgical supplies will make the biggest environmental impact. "Consider how the products are made, what they're made of and what can be done with them after they're used."

Daniel Cook