Follow me on Digg

Find Me On Digg: renewenergy

Username:

renewenergy

New Features

• 1See what the people you follow are digging Not seeing much activity? Find people to follow »
• 2See the top stories as dugg by your friends!
• 3Click Top News for the classic "global" view of Digg
• 4Submit stories with just a couple clicks

My Latest News

easy to follow green build job site photos and build notes

stlouisrenewableenergy.com— Green Build Job Site Photos with Start to Finish Build Notes.How to build a Curved Wall. Green Landscaping Photos,Red Maple Trees,Yard,Fertilizer,S...

Green and Eco Friendly: Ten Ways to Cut Summer Fuel costs

stlouisrenewableenergy.blogspot.com— It's summer and as predictable as barbeques and family vacations gas prices are creeping up. It seems the price at the pump increases with demand, ...

Do You Snowboard Green?

snowboardgreen.com — Get the real scoop on environmentally and socially responsible snowboarding gear and industry news.

BP Seeking Investors- Not with MY $money$

stlouisrenewableenergy.blogspot.com— Such sad news to report: BP needs Money-When reading the article.... It seems to me the BP Company is having some $money$ troubles. I just had to s...

• 1211

  diggs

WTF?! Big Oil about to get $31 billion from US taxpayers

consumerenergyreport.com— Everyone who thinks Big Oil should get $31 billion from U.S. taxpayers, please sign on the dotted line. That’s the message of a new ad running toda...

1

Dugg by renewenergy

• 214 Comments

American Made Solar Panel Modules

End of Month Solar Deals-July With over 200kW available in modules, we have some great pricing on American made modules, Enphase, and additional 230W modules. Let us know if you have any projects in of need help. With great customer service we hope we to satisfy all your PV needs. We Look forward to working with you. Scotts Contracting Email Free Green Estimate I will be posting additional details

Congratulations to-Barnes-Jewish Hospital/Washington University, St. Louis

Best Hospitals 2010-11: the Honor Roll

By By Avery Comarow, USNews.com Wed, Jul 14, 2010

Send

Share

Print

Buzz up!vote now

Health Search

Drug Search

Explore and compare medications

It's no secret that all hospitals are not equal. The special quality shared by the 152 that made it into the new 2010-11 Best Hospitals rankings (out of nearly 5,000 that were considered), and even more so by the 14 in this year's Honor Roll, is their ability to take on and meet the most difficult challenges. Their operating rooms showcase delicate, demanding procedures—excising a cancerous portion of a pancreas without destroying the rest of the fragile organ, say, or restoring function to an arthritis-ravaged hand through a creative blend of fusing joints and splicing tendons. They are referral centers for ill patients with multiple risks—advanced age plus heart failure plus diabetes, perhaps.

Patients at these centers are not free from hospital-based infections or immune from getting the wrong drugs or becoming victims of other medical errors. No matter how skilled or deep their expertise, even "best hospitals" don't do everything right. But when the stakes are high, calling for unusual capabilities, they are hospitals that can save lives that might otherwise be lost or preserve quality of life that might otherwise be sacrificed. That is why U.S. News has published the Best Hospitals rankings for 21 years: to help guide patients who need high-stakes care because of the complexity or difficulty of their condition or procedure. For 2010-11 we analyzed 4,852 hospitals, virtually every one in the United States, in 16 specialties from cancer and heart disease to respiratory disorders and urology. Only 152 centers appear in even one of the 16 specialty rankings. Fourteen ultra-elite Honor Roll hospitals had very high scores in six or more specialties.

Children's Hospitals Rankings

In 12 of the 16 specialties, the quality of hospital care can determine life or death. Therefore the largest part of each hospital's score in those 12 specialties came from death rates and other hard data on patient safety, volume, and various care-related factors such as nursing and patient services. The rest of the score was derived from a reputational survey of specialists. The 50 highest scorers were ranked. Scores and complete data for another 1,740 unranked hospitals are also available. In the four other specialties—ophthalmology, psychiatry, rehabilitation, and rheumatology—hospitals were ranked on reputation alone. The number of deaths in these specialties is so low that mortality data and certain other categories of data are not relevant factors.

A detailed description of the analysis in the 12 specialties is available. In brief, death rate, care-related factors, and patient safety added up to slightly more than two-thirds of each hospital's score. The reputation portion of the score used responses from nearly 10,000 physicians, who were surveyed in 2008, 2009, and 2010 and asked to name five hospitals they consider among the best in their specialty for difficult cases, ignoring cost or location.

The Honor Roll requirements were so stiff that 99.7 percent of all centers in the nation were excluded. A hospital had to be ranked in at least six specialties, but ranking alone was insufficient for inclusion. It also had to have an extremely high score (in statisticians' terms, at least 3 standard deviations above the mean). That earned 1 point per specialty. Reaching the top of the Honor Roll called for even higher scores (4 or more standard deviations above the mean), earning 2 points, in far more specialties. The highest-ranked hospitals on the Honor Roll, which is ordered by points, had high scores in 15 of the 16 specialty rankings. Johns Hopkins stands at No. 1—as it has for the last 20 years.

Rank	Hospital	Points	Specialties
1	Johns Hopkins Hospital, Baltimore	30	15
2	Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minn.	28	15
3	Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston	27	15
4	Cleveland Clinic	26	13
5	Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center, Los Angeles	24	14
6	New York-Presbyterian University Hospital of Columbia and Cornell	21	11
7	University of California, San Francisco Medical Center	20	11
8	Barnes-Jewish Hospital/Washington University, St. Louis	17	10
9	Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia	16	12
10	Duke University Medical Center, Durham, N.C.	16	10
11	Brigham and Women's Hospital, Boston	14	10
12	University of Washington Medical Center, Seattle	14	8
13	UPMC-University of Pittsburgh Medical Center	13	8
14	University of Michigan Hospitals and Health Centers, Ann Arbor	12	8

Lawn Care-Green Lawn-Low Maintenance Yard

todays tip: Better Lawn Practices Read the full tip online What? Three golden rules.  1)  Choose a type of grass that's low-maintenance and appropriate for your climate.  2) Set your mower blade at the correct height.  3) Leave your clippings as fertilizer. How? Some grasses don't need to be mowed at all.  Imagine that!  As for clippings, they do the job of store-bought fertilizers naturally.  Why shell out when you've already got it covered? Why? Some grasses don't need to be mowed at all.  Imagine that!  As for clippings, they do the job of store-bought fertilizers naturally.  Why shell out when you've already got it covered? Did You Know? Lawn irrigation accounts for up to 30% of total water use on the East Coast, according to the National Wildlife Federation Okay, But How Hard Is It? As easy as spending less time cutting the grass - and more time enjoying your favorite summer activities.  Read the full tip online July 14, 2010 Send to a Friend | www.ecomii.com

St Louis Electronic Recycling News

St Louis Electronic Recycling News
Thank you for your interest in a Electronic/Computer Recycling event for your building(s) and their employees. As a part of the Downtown Partnership and other initiatives, our goal is to help building owners and managers offer a tax deductible environmentally sound Electronic Recycling pickup service to all of their buildings with multiple businesses and their employees in St. Louis Metro and Metro East.

You may recall the Cardinals event a couple of months ago that WITS did as a part of the Partnership.

The process for your buildings that you own or manage is very basic:

1) Management Company and WITS decides on a collection Date, items accepted, and if its a week-long or one day building collection

2) Management Company sends a letter to each of the businesses in the building inviting them and their employees to participate.

3) Any questions from businesses can be referred to WITS by email or phone. If a business prefers a separate pickup we can provide you with a business reservation form and employees can still participate with this form as well.

4) All items accepted free but WITS is asking for assistance covering television recycling costs.  Monitors and Televisions on average have a $5-10 recycling fee WITS has to pay to recycle according to DNR and EPA rules.

5) We also ask if the building managers or businesses would help cover our truck and labor costs, this runs about $200 per truck and includes 3-4 man labor. In the past Businesses have split this cost.

Items are usually waiting at a dock or easy access door to street.  We have Low and High trucks.

WITS arrives at specified building on the day agreed and load our truck with items to recycle.
Buildings may decide to collect the entire week or just one day. In that case WITS can arrive early morning and spend the day collecting as businesses and employees bring down their items or drop off their items.

It is possible that WITS could provide extra help to have staff go to the business offices to collect items with carts but because of liability most buildings do not allow this. If this is something you are interested in please talk to us about it.

Thank you again and please let us know if you would like to do this type of an event with WITS. We have several building collections already scheduled Downtown and in West County for the summer and hope to reach many more before end of summer.

Have a great weekend


Angela Haas
President

WITS
647 E Holly
Saint Louis MO 63147
314-382-1650
or
1017 Griggs St
Danville Il 61832

Http://witsinc.org <http://witsinc.org/>


"Thank you for helping help us bridge the digital divide and save our Mother Earth"

--
Scott's Contracting
scottscontracting@gmail.com
http://www.stlouisrenewableenergy.blogspot.com
http://www.stlouisrenewableenergy.com
scotty@stlouisrenewableenergy.com

Solar America Cities

Solar America Cities

---

Cities across the country are taking action to make solar energy a more viable option for their communities. These Solar America Cities are using innovative approaches to remove market barriers to solar and to encourage adoption of solar energy technologies at the local level.

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) selected 13 Solar America Cities in June 2007 and an additional 12 cities in March 2008 to help lay the foundation for a solar energy market that can serve as a model for cities around the nation.

Click on a city in the map below, or click on a city name in the alphabetical listing to the left to visit the Solar America Cities' pages on this Web site.

-- Scott's Contracting scottscontracting@gmail.com http://www.stlouisrenewableenergy.blogspot.com http://www.stlouisrenewableenergy.com scotty@stlouisrenewableenergy.com

USA Bills BP for $ 221.9 Million Total

Add 99.7 Million to Existing BP Gulf Oil Spill Debt

Your Advertisment Here

USA Bills BP for $ 221.9 Million Total by Scottys Calculations 99.7Million in Current Charges + (plus) (3 Prior Paid Bills totaling: 99.7)=$221.9 Million US. This Oil Spill shows how deep the pockets BP Oil Company is/are. This cost would break the backs of a normal business. How in the World is BP continuing to operate after paying such a Bill? How much is this company charging for the Oil they Produce if they can pay bills such as are being levied against them. I'm dearly afraid that the buck will be passed onto "We" the consumer in the end. Stay Tuned for more info! Obama administration bills BP for $99.7 million

Your Advertisment Here

Posted Tue Jul 13, 2010 11:41am PDT (yahoo)-WASHINGTON - The Obama administration says it has sent a fourth bill to BP and other parties seeking $99.7 million for costs related to the response and cleanup of the Gulf oil spill. The administration says three earlier bills, totaling $122.2 million, have been paid in full. The White House has said all along that BP is responsible for the disaster and must pay all costs associated with the response to the spill, including efforts to stop the leak, reduce the oil's spread and the long-term recovery of the Gulf Coast region. THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below. WASHINGTON (AP) — The Obama administration says it has sent a fourth bill to BP and other parties seeking $99.7 billion for costs related to the response and cleanup of the Gulf oil spill. The administration says three earlier bills, totaling $122.2 million, have been paid in full. The White House has said all along that BP is responsible for the disaster and must pay all costs associated with the response to the spill, including efforts to stop the leak, reduce the oil's spread and the long-term recovery of the Gulf Coast region.

Your Advertisment Here