TY - JOUR

T1 - Environmental auditing in hospitals

T2 - Approach and implementation in an university hospital

AU - Dettenkofer, Markus

AU - Kümmerer, Klaus

AU - Schuster, A.

AU - Mühlich, Martin

AU - Scherrer, Martin

AU - Daschner, F. D.

N1 - Funding Information: This work was supported by a grant from the Ministry of the Environment, Baden-Wiirttemberg, Germany. The authors wish to thank Mr W. Franke, State Agency for Environmental Protection (Landesanstalt fiir Umweltschutz, Baden-Wtirttemberg), Mr W. Baur, State Ministry of the Environment, the members of the steering committee, Professor E. Schopf together with the staff of the dermatological clinic and all people who supported this work by advice and by giving information.

PY - 1997/5/1

Y1 - 1997/5/1

N2 - Medical audit in infection control today is accepted as an important element in the quality assurance of health care. In contrast, environmental auditing, which was approved in 1993 by the Council of the European Communities for industry ('Eco-Management and Audit Scheme-EMAS), has not so far been used as a tool to control and reduce environmental pollution caused by medical care in hospitals. The aim of this study was to investigate, whether environmental auditing in hospitals is useful. This process should also be cost effective. In this paper, methodological and organizational issues are described. Initially an environmental review of activities at the University Hospital, Freiburg and an eco-analysis of the input and output were performed. The first results of the study and a critical discussion will be presented in another paper.

AB - Medical audit in infection control today is accepted as an important element in the quality assurance of health care. In contrast, environmental auditing, which was approved in 1993 by the Council of the European Communities for industry ('Eco-Management and Audit Scheme-EMAS), has not so far been used as a tool to control and reduce environmental pollution caused by medical care in hospitals. The aim of this study was to investigate, whether environmental auditing in hospitals is useful. This process should also be cost effective. In this paper, methodological and organizational issues are described. Initially an environmental review of activities at the University Hospital, Freiburg and an eco-analysis of the input and output were performed. The first results of the study and a critical discussion will be presented in another paper.

KW - Chemistry

KW - Audit

KW - EMAS

KW - environmental pollution

KW - hospital ecology

KW - infection control

KW - audit

KW - EMAS

KW - Environmental pollution

KW - hospital ecology

KW - infection control

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=0030972258&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1016/S0195-6701(97)90087-6

DO - 10.1016/S0195-6701(97)90087-6

M3 - Journal articles

VL - 36

SP - 17

EP - 22

JO - Journal of Hospital Infection

JF - Journal of Hospital Infection

SN - 0195-6701

IS - 1

ER -