Boston Medical Center is the first hospital in the nation to give patients a discount on their energy pills, thanks to their new Clean Power Prescription program, WBUR reported Oct. 18.
The hospital took advantage of a federal tax credit to install solar panels on the roof of one administrative building. The panels send electricity into the grid, which is metered and converted into clean energy credits. The hospital then gives those credits to certain patients to use on their monthly energy bills.
In the pilot program, the credits will go to 80 households of patients in their complex care management program who are lower-income. The credits average $50 a month for a total of $600 a year.
The program addresses "utility insecurity" which is one of the social determinants of health that hospitals screen for, Anna Goldman, MD, a primary care physician at the hospital and co-founder of the Clean Power Prescription program, told WBUR. She said reliable electricity is "a basic human need."
BMC has enrolled the first households in the program and already has plans to expand it. The hospital said it wants to partner with outside organizations that can host their own solar arrays and donate half of their energy credits to hospital patients.