St. Barnabas Hospital has been celebrating over 150 years of patient care. The SBH Health System family loves to serve the people of the Bronx community and make sure every patient gets the best care as possible. By officially launching the Healthy Beverage Zone (HBZ), SBH Health System has become part of the Bronx-wide movement to promote healthy beverage options for all how work, live and visit the Bronx. SBH is one of the borough’s largest HBZ partner and its first hospital core member. As part of this process, SBH has eliminated beverages with added sugar from vending machines, the cafeteria and meetings.  With a responsibility as leaders in the community, the SBH Health and Wellness Committee has challenged its employees to take a pledge to refrain from drinking sugary drinks while at SBH especially and particularly in front of patients. Those who choose to become “HBZ Campions” are asked to switch to healthier beverages such as water, seltzer, unsweetened teas, and low-fat milk; encourage fellow employee and visitors to also make health beverage choices; and promote HBZ at SBH. In addition, as a continual promotion of HBZ, SBH has done informational tabling displays throughout the hospital to educate and promote the importance of living a sugar free beverage life. The displays educated employees and patients on the amount of sugar in popular beverages. St. Barnabas Hospital also did a Healthy Beverage Zone contest where employees sent in their ideas and recipes of healthy beverages. The nutrition department displayed the recipes to sample and vote on a winner.  In July they held educational session for their interns to help give them ideas on how to promote healthy beverages when interacting with other patients and their families. In addition, SBH outreach educational team goes out to local school to set up health fairs and part of their education is to promote awareness on sugary beverages. Promoting a healthier lifestyle will continue to fight against the rates of obesity and help further issues down the road by just not giving people the temptation to buy sugary drinks in hospitals and throughout the Bronx!

By Alexandra Batista

Contact info:

Interviewer: Cecelia Moy (Clinical Nutrition Manager)

Website: http://www.sbhny.org/about-us/

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