Sustainability in Nursing: Resources for action

Why did you decide to pursue a career in nursing? There are probably many reasons but for most nurses, at least one factor is a desire to care for people. Practising sustainably can improve the care you give, not just to the patient in front of you, but also to the wider communities we serve (local and global), and the natural world we depend on.

Nurses have a duty to protect and promote public health in the face of these threats and have a unique and vital role to play. Their expertise, diverse roles and the trust invested in them mean they can be leaders in protecting the health of the public from the consequences of climate change. 

- Royal College of Nursing, October 2019 

Why is sustainability important in nursing?

We are facing many challenges in healthcare, from COVID to underfunding and understaffing, to managing the health consequences of our increasingly unequal society.

There is another significant issue that we are all aware of but sometimes push to the back of our minds – climate change and environmental degradation. Some of us have already faced the difficulty providing services during flooding, storms, and heatwaves. We have all had to cope with the pandemic – which was made more likely by environmental degradation. If we continue on our current path, we will see an increase in pandemics, illness caused by air pollution, food and water scarcity, and more extreme weather events, all of which will have an effect on our patients and communities, as well as on ourselves and our workplace.

The environmental footprint of healthcare

It's difficult to hear, but the healthcare sector is responsible for 5-10% of global greenhouse gas emissions and huge amounts of pollution, which was exacerbated during the pandemic by increased use of PPE. Many of us are striving to do the right thing at home but feel as though it all goes out the window at work, where we discard tonnes of single-use plastic every day. It is causing harm to people's health and conflicts with the reason we entered nursing. We know the problem is going to get worse, but it can feel too big and too distant to face up to when we are already so overworked.

But don’t despair - it is possible to put things right!

Sustainability in nursing

First, remember that practicing ‘sustainable’ healthcare doesn’t have to be more time-consuming or expensive - in fact it often saves money and time!

Second, it can provide better care, with wider benefits than traditional services for our patients and communities.

Third, it allows you to live your values at work.  When we live according to our values, we experience more sense of purpose, direction, energy and fulfilment. We may also exhibit deeper resilience to the shocks of life, and feeling part of the  huge and growing global movement for positive change can help you to cope with any worries and fears about the climate crisis– because you are doing something about it.

As the largest workforce group in healthcare, and the largest user group for equipment and consumables, nurses are powerful agents of change. Working across acute care, primary care, public health, and community settings, even small actions, when spread across networks, can have a significant impact.

NHS England has made a commitment to achieve Net Zero Emissions by 2040. Trusts must develop a Green Plan this year and may be searching for interested staff to help deliver on it. Because sustainable transformation requires staff engagement and training, request from your trust to fund your sustainable healthcare training.

Sustainable healthcare courses for nurses

Free online module: Building a Net Zero NHS

This free, 30 minute elearning for healthcare module outlines the vision and opportunities of a sustainable healthcare system. It includes short animated films, interactive activities and case studies of successful projects in hospitals, primary care and community nursing.

Short CPD courses

The Centre for Sustainable Healthcare offers continuing professional development courses in three parts:

1. Self-study: 4-6 hour interactive online package with case studies
2. Workshop: 4 hour small group online workshop facilitated by national experts
3. Sustainable Healthcare Cafes: 2 hour follow up cafes offer a friendly and informal setting to build networks and receive advice from experts and peers on sustainability projects. Technical course participants will be invited to a follow up session specifically linked to their workshop

Nursing practitioners may be interested in attending the following specific courses in sustainability, health and healthcare:

• Introduction to Sustainable Healthcare: this 8 hour course is a fantastic start to your sustainability journey, it introduces concepts such as doughnut economics, the triple bottom line. It will give you a good foundation about the role of healthcare in climate change and has interactive case studies to improve your understanding of sustainability within healthcare. - Jenni
• Sustainable Primary Care: if you are a nurse working in Primary Care this course provides a wealth of information about how Primary Care practices are linked to carbon pollution, why this is important and how you can get involved in sustainable quality improvement in this area. There are worked examples of projects which have been completed and areas of interest.
• Sustainable Mental Healthcare: this course brings together ways in which mental health care can become socially, environmentally and economically sustainable; it describes the connection between the climate breakdown and mental illness and explains the ways in which the sustainable principles can be applied to mental health care, highlighting the key role mental health professionals play in encouraging sustainable practise.
• Carbon Footprinting for Healthcare: this course explains what a carbon footprint is and how it can be estimated, with relevant examples to help you then use this on a small quality improvement project.
• Green Space and Health: the aim of this course is to empower you to develop your own ‘Green Space initiative’; in order to do this you will learn the role of green space in sustainable healthcare and the benefits of green and blue space engagement, along with later translating these benefits into a clinical setting and identifying pre-existing, local initiatives.
• Sustainable Quality Improvement: offers a great way to learn about making real changes within your practice. It takes you through how to look at the social, environmental and financial impacts and will empower you to undertake your own “SusQI” project - take a look here for more information on SusQI.

Resources for action

The Centre for Sustainable Healthcare seeks to empower and inspire healthcare professionals to incorporate sustainable practices into their daily practice. Through the Green Nurse Network we connect nurses, students, nurse educators, and retired nurses who are concerned about the challenges posed by climate change and want to collaborate to determine what this means for nursing practice.

Some of the ideas discussed on the network include: 

• Lowering your nursing practice's resource usage
• Changing patient pathways to develop leaner care
• Initiatives that promote prevention
• Ways to protect patients or the public from the health effects of climate change
• Patient empowerment

The Nurses Drawdown movement encourages nurses to take personal and professional action in five key areas: energy, gender equity, food, mobility, and nature.

They Royal College of Nursing have an online subject guide on sustainable healthcare and nursing practices