Chamberlain Dunn and the Centre for Sustainable Healthcare are launching an awards programme recognising sustainability in healthcare across the UK.
The health and care system in England is responsible for an estimated 4-5% of the country’s carbon footprint. The NHS has now committed to achieving Net Zero carbon emissions, a first for any national health system. The challenge of achieving Net Zero and reducing the environmental impact of healthcare will require the support of all the 1.3 million employees working in the NHS.
With these new UK awards we will capture and share the progress already made in meeting those sustainability targets. Projects and initiatives that embed sustainable healthcare will also benefit patient care as the climate emergency we face is also a health emergency.
Together with our sponsors, we aim to bring a body of learning to the healthcare community on successful sustainability approaches that can be widely adopted and promoted.
We will establish this programme as a regular event in the healthcare calendar, engaging the workforce in sustainability, encouraging and sharing of best practice examples to support healthcare organisations to reach Net Zero.
Alison Dunn, Managing Director Chamberlain Dunn
Rachel Stancliffe, Director, The Centre for Sustainable Healthcare
The Centre for Sustainable Healthcare is a registered charity that has offered strategic input and consultancy on sustainable healthcare research and practice to national and local programmes since our establishment in 2008.
The Centre works with partners to engage healthcare professionals, patients and the wider community in understanding the connections between health and environment and reducing healthcare’s resource footprint.
Our programmes provide methodologies and metrics to enable healthcare professionals to develop sustainable models of care. Our acclaimed Sustainable Specialties programme mainstreams sustainability within clinical areas so that it is integral to the planning of health systems and healthcare practice. The programme is supported by our work in medical education and in carbon modelling of clinical care.
Our green space projects, including our NHS Forest, assist healthcare organisations to improve their natural environment and reconnect their staff, patients and the wider community with their local green space to benefit their health and wellbeing.
Organising awards programmes in healthcare is a major part of our work. For the Healthcare People Management Association we organise the annual multi-sponsored UK-wide Excellence Awards which this year was judged virtually involving more than 100 people over five days; and several regional awards for the Association. We organise the Social Prescribing Network awards for the Network and the College of Medicine; and we work with the UK Public Health Register to organise awards for their practitioners, presented as part of their annual conference. We also have a Complementary Therapy awards programme.
Our own Advancing Healthcare awards, now 15 years old, are open to allied health professionals, such as occupational therapists and physiotherapists, healthcare scientists and those who work alongside them and are sponsored and supported by all four UK health departments. We have related Advancing
Healthcare events for the Welsh and Northern Ireland Governments.