Building Value Chain Capacity: Sustainability's Role in Product Purchasing and Service Procurement for Healthcare

Join Sustainable Pittsburgh's Champions for Sustainability (C4S) network along with the Sustainable Healthcare Series Planning Committee to learn about the latest strategies for engaging supply chains in the healthcare industry from the perspective of sustainability.

Date: March 8, 2012

Time: 8:00 am – 10:30 am
Location: Regional Learning Alliance
850 Cranberry Woods Drive
Cranberry Township, PA 16066

Also available in webinar format-- details forthcoming.

Cost: $15 for C4S/Sustainable Pittsburgh Members
$25 Nonmembers
Students: Special Rate

Breakfast Provided

Click here to register.

Watch a video from WPXI's "Our Region's Business" about this series.

Given the scale and scope of Southwestern Pennsylvania’s healthcare sector, supply chain innovations emerge as important, regional areas for sustainability and opportunity:

Supply chains are a gateway to becoming more sustainable:

Emphasizing the importance of green purchasing and its relevance to sustainability, Practice Greenhealth, a national organization for institutions in the healthcare community that have made a commitment to sustainable, eco-friendly practices, states:

[H]ealth-care organizations can influence their upstream supply chains to move toward more sustainable practices by working with supply chain aggregators commonly used in health care, such as group purchasing organizations (GPOs). Collaborative efforts with such suppliers can bring safer and cleaner products into health-care facilities. Due to their scale, when large health care facilities and companies green up their supply chains, they have a strong positive effect, due to the sheer volume of their purchases. (The Business Case for Greening Healthcare, Practice Green Health, 2008)

Come learn from regional leaders who are working to build the capacity for our healthcare sector’s sustainability through their supply chain strategies and practices.

Agenda

8:00                 Registration

8:30                 Opening Remarks

8:40 – 9:30      Keynote Address

Gary Cohen, Executive Director, Healthcare Without Harm:

"Embedding Sustainability in Healthcare's DNA through Purchasing and Acquisition"

9:30 – 10:30   

Models of Sustainable Purchasing: Strategies for Choosing Suppliers and Opportunities for Selecting Reusable Products in Healthcare Delivery

Kurt M. Duska, President, Engineered Plastics, LLC (Regional Healthcare Plastics Recycling)

Judith Focareta RN, MEd, Coordinator, Environmental Health Initiatives, Magee-Womens Hospital of UPMC

Brenda Jones, Senior Source Analyst, Supply Chain Division, UPMC

10:30 Conclusion              

Who should attend?

This event is a "must attend" for professionals in the healthcare industry who are interested in gaining knowledge and how-to assistance on a variety of topics related to green and aggregated purchasing in healthcare.

Registration Information

• C4S/Sustainable Pittsburgh members register online $15.00:

• Non-members register online $25.00:

About the Sustainability and Healthcare Series

Sustainable Pittsburgh’s sustainable business network, Champions for Sustainability (C4S) has launched a series of workshops that advance the mutually reinforcing agendas of sustainability and healthcare.

Each event spotlights how sustainability improves health outcomes, healthcare benefits, business performance and provides best practices, resources, examples, and how to get started.

Click here to learn more about the series and to view materials from past programs in the series.

For more information, please contact:

Matthew M. Mehalik, Ph.D., Program Manager, Sustainable Pittsburgh mmehalik@sustainablepittsburgh.org