In late 2013, HCWH decided to conduct a contest for nurses about climate change solutions. The idea was simple. Ask nurses to tell us why they care about climate change and ask them to submit proposals about addressing the causes and/or impacts of climate change. Why nurses? Not only are nurses the most trusted of all professions, they are on the frontlines of treating what ails us…which over the coming decades will increasingly be impacted by a changing climate.

What transpired over the next few months left us feeling hopeful and inspired as nurses from small hospitals, major health systems, academia, non-profits, community organizations, and nursing schools submitted a broad spectrum of incredibly thoughtful proposals.  

We received so many great proposals that selecting “winners” proved incredibly challenging. In the end, we felt compelled to select and fund two 1st prize winners instead of one. The winning proposals came from a team of nurses from the University of Michigan and a nurse at Gundersen Health System in La Crosse, Wisconsin.  

Meet our winners:

Angela Wan and Valerie Tran will be working on a project based in Fresno County, California, in a community increasingly at risk from extreme heat events, and already vulnerable based on socioeconomic factors. These amazing young women, in partnership with the County Department of Public Health, will work to ensure that a cadre of public health nurses receive training to make sure that this community is prepared for a future increasingly stressed by climate change. But along the way, they will be planting seeds of change to promote health and improve the resiliency of our communities. 

Deb Rislow, RN and VP of Operations from Gundersen Health System, will help oversee a project to provide education to over 1600 nurses in the Gundersen health System to promote effective and cost efficient ways to reduce energy and use of products that cause harm to the environment. The project will provide leadership techniques and strategies for nurses to educate others and will engage nurses to tell their stories about how they are reducing their climate footprint. Imagine the impact once these 1600 nurses are taking on climate and environmental sustainability. 

Second and third place winners, Jessica Castner and Karen McKenny, will join our first place winners at our annual CleanMed Conference from June 3 to 5 in Cleveland, OH, to present their climate change solutions.

“I'm a Mother/Baby nurse who cares about climate change because, I want a world that can sustainably nurture our future generations. Our fossil fuel dependent lifestyles warm our planet while leaching environmental toxins, which severely impact our health, biodiversity, and survival worldwide. .  . [I believe in] doing all that I can, whenever possible, to make this world a better place. Because, many little drops can fill the bucket of change.”

Contest participants were also asked to answer the question, “I’m a nurse and I care about climate change because . . .”.  The vast majority of answers were incredibly heart felt and moving. Here is one example submitted from a nurse at Kaiser Permanente:

Over the coming months, we will be sharing the journey of these winning projects. Stay tuned . . .