Green ICU Collaborative
Our Purpose
Our Team
Houston Methodist ICUs treat over 29,000 patients annually, giving us a profound opportunity to reshape the future of critical care medicine. One such area for improvement is our impact on the planet.
Health care accounts for 10% of our nation’s greenhouse gas emissions. Within health care, intensive care units (ICUs) are “carbon hot spots,” emitting enough daily greenhouse gas emissions to rival driving a car over 62 million miles.
ICUs are also large producers of medical waste, especially single-use items. A 2024 research study found that just one Houston Methodist ICU used 1,464,262 medical supplies in a six-month period.
Caring for one ICU patient per day can result in approximately:
- 108 disposable gloves
- 57 compresses
- 24 syringes
- 16 disposable gowns
- 9 surgical masks
Thus, the Houston Methodist Center for Critical Care established the Green ICU Initiative in 2024 to reduce systemwide ICU carbon emissions and waste. Following the principles for reduce, reuse, recycle and repurpose, our goals are met by:
- Optimizing patient length-of-stay
- Reducing excessive resource use
- Reusing equipment when possible
- Maximizing recycling
- Research and innovation
Our Team
In partnership with the Houston Methodist Office of Sustainability, the Initiative is led by Faisal N. Masud, MD, FCCP, FCCM, Medical Director of the Center for Critical Care.
The Initiative has also attracted partners across Houston and the Texas Medical Center, establishing a novel collaborative approach to sustainable health care best practices. To our team’s knowledge, this collective commitment to reducing carbon emissions and waste across the Texas Medical Center is the first of its kind in the country.
The Initiative is further bolstered by the following international leaders and experts in the field of health care sustainability:
- Heather Baid, PhD, principal lecturer at the University of Brighton, UK
- Lousie Trent, BHB, MBChB, Dip Obs, Intensive Care Physician in New Zealand and co-author of A Beginners Guide to Sustainability in the ICU and A Beginners Guide to:
Green Teams in the ICU - Forbes McGain - Associate Dean Healthcare Sustainability, University of Melbourne, Australia
- Jean Louise Vincent, MD, PhD, professor of intensive care medicine at the University of Brussels
and intensivist in the Department of Intensive Care at Erasme University Hospital in Brussels - ANZICS organization and its leaders (ANZICS)
- Society of Critical Care Medicine (SCCM Sustainability Task Force)
Presentations
Houston Methodist is Leading the Green Health Care Movement
While health care sustainability has been an established focus in other countries, Green ICUs are in their infancy in America. Our team is filling our nation’s knowledge gaps through research and innovation.
A 2024 research article published in Critical Care by Dr. Masud and colleagues shares experiences from Houston Methodist’s Green ICU Initiative. The article also proposes a three-step pathway to overcoming health care sustainability challenges.
Additionally, state-of-the-art projects, such as our systemwide virtual ICU (vICU) program, continues to show potential for low-carbon emissions without compromising patient safety and quality of care.
In line with our I CARE values; Houston Methodist is proud to be at the core of the green health care movement. Learn more about how the Center for Critical Care and Office of Sustainability are supporting Green ICU Initiative projects.
Green ICU Initiative- Research and Publications:
- "Environmental Sustainability in ICUs: A Report From the Society of Critical Care Medicine Sustainability Task Force" - PubMed
- "Past, present, and future of sustainable intensive care: narrative review and a large hospital system experience" - Critical Care
Events and Conferences
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