Team members take a break on the bench made from the Surgery Department’s own plastic film they recycled in the past year.
When Bonnie Humiston heard about the NexTrex Plastic Film Recycling Challenge, she took one look at the heaping pile of plastic waste in her department and got to thinking, hey, we can do this!
“I loved the idea, and it seemed simple enough to manage,” said Bonnie, clinical coordinator for Akron Children’s Pediatric General Surgery, Urology and Burn Institute. “Then, when I introduced the idea at our daily Huddle meeting, I couldn’t believe how receptive everyone was to it. We collected 150 pounds of plastic in the first week and a half!”
The Surgery Department produces a good amount of plastic waste daily. Many of its sterile surgery supplies — from surgical gowns, drapes and gloves to needles and sutures — come in plastic film packaging.
Bonnie saw the NexTrex program as an easy way to recycle this plastic waste. NexTrex supplies the department with collection bins to place around the center. A few times a week, Bonnie collects the plastic waste from the bins and takes them to participating drop-off locations in the community to recycle it.
Bonnie and her team began the NexTrex program on Nov. 1 of last year and reached their goal of 1,000 pounds of plastic film just 2 months later.
Once at the collection site, she weighs the plastic waste, snaps a picture of it and uploads the picture to her NexTrex account to record and count it toward her goal. Once the 1,000-pound goal is reached, NexTrex donates a bench made of the plastic waste to the organization.
“I’m just the hauler,” she laughed. “I drag my wagon in about 3 days a week to collect the plastic film in our department. The OR (operating room) team is doing the great work. They are the ones that made it successful and took the time to collect the plastic.”
Bonnie and her team began the NexTrex program on Nov. 1 of last year and reached their goal of 1,000 pounds of plastic film just 2 months later. The center now proudly displays their bench made of recycled materials at the front desk.
But, Bonnie and the team aren’t stopping there. While they can’t start the program over again for a year, they are donating their plastic film waste to other local organizations so they, too, can get a bench. To date, they have collected 1,762 pounds of plastic waste.
“We only get 1 bench per organization a year, so we’ve reached out to other organizations in the community to offer them a bench,” said Bonnie. “We’re doing all the leg work of recycling our plastic film, and they’ll benefit from it.”
On Nov. 1, the surgery department plans to start the program over and collect another 1,000 pounds of plastic waste to get Akron Children’s a second bench.
“I just thought it was a cool thing to do to get staff excited about recycling,” said Bonnie. “Every little bit counts toward a more sustainable future.”
