St. Louis HELP is "Green" on Earth Day -- and Every Day

ST. LOUIS - April 20, 2016 - PRLog -- The St. Louis Health Equipment Lending Program - St. Louis HELP - is celebrating Earth Day on Sunday, April 24 even though the nonprofit charitable organization is "green" every day of the year.

"We are a 'green' organization all year due to the many tons of waste that we divert from local area landfills," says St. Louis HELP Executive Director Laura Cannon Singer, who founded the organization in June 2008. (http://www.stlhelp.org).

St. Louis HELP accepts donations of nearly every type of home medical equipment, then cleans and revitalizes it and loans it - for free - to anyone who needs it or their caregivers.

In 2015 St. Louis HELP loaned 5,570 health equipment items for free and, in doing so, diverted about 150 tons of equipment from solid waste landfills.

Between June 2008 through December 31, 2015, St. Louis HELP:

·        Loaned 380.76 tons of reconditioned home health equipment for free

·        Forwarded 83.12 tons of home health equipment to partner charities

·        Actively recycled 324.54 tons of unusable home health items, and

·        In total, diverted 788.42 tons of used home health items from landfills.

"We collect about 11,000 items of donated home health equipment annually," says Laura. "We revitalize or recycle it all. Good parts of broken equipment are used for repairs. Any broken wooden crutches are recycled to a wood chipper. Nothing is wasted."

St. Louis HELP conducts two home health equipment drives annually to collect its inventory, and also accepts equipment donations all year. For details, call 314.567.4700.

The group will host a semi-annual equipment donation drive on Saturday, May 14. Anyone can drop off unwanted home health equipment between 9 a.m. and 2 p.m. at parking lots in these 14 designated Walgreen's locations:

8571 Watson Road 314-962-5545 - Webster Groves (Watson & Elm)

1 Grasso Plaza 314-631-8800 - Affton (Gravois & S. Rock Hill)

9801 Manchester 314-963-3256 - Rock Hill (Manchester & Kortwright)

13992 Manchester Road 636-227-9228 - Manchester (Manchester & Weidman)

4400 Lemay Ferry Road 314-487-0636 - So. County (Lemay & Forder)

14950 Clayton Road 636-527-7873 - Chesterfield (Clarkson & Baxter)

12345 St. Charles Rock Road 314-770-2479 - Bridgeton (St. Charles Rock Rd. & 270)

3920 Hampton Avenue 314-351-2100 - South City (Hampton & Chippewa)

460 N. Lindbergh/Hwy 57 314-831-6448 - Florissant (Lindbergh & Washington)

2310 S. Old Highway 94 636-477-7996 - St. Charles (Old Hwy 94 & Muegge Rd.)

5890 N. Belt West 618-277-4440 - Belleville (N. Belt West & Frank Scott)

1001 Bowles Avenue 636-343-0754 - Fenton (Bowles & Highway 141)

2329 W. Clay Street 636-949-6613 - St. Charles (West Clay & Droste)

890 Washington Cors 636-239-7483 - Washington (Hwy 47 & Hwy 100)

St. Louis HELP volunteers will be on hand at the St. Louis Earth Day Festival on Sunday, April 24th from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. on the Muny Grounds at Forest Park. Admission is free. This year's theme is "Think Global, Act STL". For details, visit www.stlouisearthday.org.

To get free loans of home health equipment or to donate health equipment you don't need, call St. Louis HELP at 314.567.4700 or see the website http://www.stlhelp.org.

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