Sustainability and the need for society to reduce its carbon footprint are important issues for us all. Here at the iO, we have been engaged at a national level as one of the 14 AHPs looking at sustainability improvements. Ben Whittaker, Chief Sustainability Officer’s Clinical Fellow at Greener NHS and working with the CAHPO team, tells us about the Greener AHP Hub and puts a personal call out to osteopaths.
“In October 2021, the Greener AHP Hub was launched, which highlights potential opportunities for AHPs to engage in or lead on sustainability improvements. It prioritises the issues and actions with the greatest impact for AHPs and is aligned to the ‘Delivering a Net Zero NHS’ report.
“The hub outlines the importance of being a Greener AHP and understanding environmental sustainability. It describes how some principles of low carbon care are already integrated into AHP practice. There are still lots of carbon hotspots that could be addressed by incorporating sustainability into quality improvement. The hub examines priority areas where AHPs are well placed to lead on net-zero carbon. For example, in public health and prevention, which is well aligned to the principles of Osteopathy.
“There are individual, team and systems-level actions for AHPs to move towards net zero carbon and we would like the hub to feature areas where Osteopaths have practised in more sustainable ways. If you have examples of sustainable practice or would like to get involved in a sustainability network for Osteopaths, then please contact me.”
Environmental sustainability will be one of the five themes in the new five-year AHP strategy to be launched this spring.
For more information visit: Greener AHP Hub or email Ben Whitter on ben.whittaker2@nhs.net