A meeting of minds for sustainable healthcare

I recently teamed up with colleague Anna-Lisa Mills , to lead a ‘sprint’ session at NWG (Northumbrian Water Group) ’s fantastic innovation festival, with a particular focus on sustainability in healthcare.

It is now three years since The Newcastle Upon Tyne Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust Hospitals became the first healthcare organisation in the world to declare a climate emergency, publicly acknowledging the link between the health of our planet and the health of the population.?

The sprint session allowed us to share information about Newcastle’s existing work to pioneer #sustainability and #netzero, including how we’re fast-tracking a reduction in carbon emissions across the whole organisation.?

Most importantly, it allowed us to seek input and explore ideas from across sectors, specifically looking at how we might further reduce #emissions to meet our net zero ambitions and deliver #sustainablehealthcare for more patients.

The sprint session benefited hugely from the input of patients, carers, NHS colleagues, representatives from the water, energy and offshore industries, and the voluntary sector, who all played an active role in wide-ranging discussions.

Using a structured approach, we asked everyone to think about the personas of people and companies that impact on the NHS sustainability agenda and what problems they might face. This enabled us to build up a 'problem statement' to take away and use in the next phase of our work, which will seek out collaborative partners to help create joint solutions to?the challenges we face.

The festival gave us a fantastic opportunity to connect with people from different companies and sectors, creating opportunities to collaboratively explore how we might deliver innovative, high quality and sustainable care for our patients.

Throughout the day, it was inspiring to hear speeches by Northumbrian Water's CIO Nigel Watson and CEO Heidi Mottram, and we also heard how Ofwat is investing ￡200 million to drive collaboration across the water industry. ?Within this fund, ￡4 million has been allocated for anyone to apply - from inventors in a garden shed, to small, medium and large companies – specifically encouraging innovation to transform water and wastewater services.

Sara Davies MBE , star of Dragons’ Den and BBC Strictly Come Dancing, was another source of inspiration and explained how her business became a huge success because she took the time to really understand her customers and what their problems were. By doing this, she was able to create solutions that were an instant success.

This is something we are constantly striving for with innovation in healthcare - to find the pinch points, the problems and seek out those innovative solutions to help bring bright ideas to life, and to then encourage wider use to deliver outstanding services and care.

Sara also emphasised how the pandemic has placed innovation as central to business survival in difficult times. No ideas are silly, it's good to move outside your comfort zone and the magic will follow.

The insight we got from the day was invaluable and we’re really thankful to Northumbrian Water for providing us with the opportunity to represent the NHS at their annual festival.?We’d love to come again!

charlotte fox , business innovation manager