Medicines waste in the care home pathway: environmental and social impacts

Join this Q exchange webinar to hear about what a project team learned in the last 12 months while undertaking their project, Medicines waste in care homes: social and environmental impacts. 

It is estimated that £50million worth of medicines are wasted in the care home pathway every year in England. This is a complex multifactorial and long standing problem. The environmental impacts of medicines waste go beyond the carbon footprint of medicines and include pharmaceutical pollution, transport emissions and impacts of incineration of medicines waste. We explored the issue with multidisciplinary teams across care homes, community pharmacies and GP practices to identify the issues and potential solutions. 

This webinar will:

1. Outline our project and its aims
2. Describe the challenges which we faced remotely managing a project in busy care settings across multiple sites
3. Share the learning from the teams, including:

• The benefits of process mapping
• The importance of communication
• The need for education on medicines waste, its impacts, how to minimise it and manage it

      4. Illustrate the impact of the project on the teams involved.

      5. Signpost to our project reports and educational resources. 

The Centre for Sustainable Healthcare (CSH) is an independent, non-profit organisation that has been at the forefront of driving sustainable, net zero and carbon reduction initiatives within the healthcare sector since 2008.

Our mission is to inspire and empower people with the knowledge, skills and tools to play their part in the transformation to sustainable healthcare. 

CSH has developed the principles of sustainable healthcare and the sustainable quality improvement (SusQI) framework to support the transformation to sustainable healthcare.

Webinar presenters:

• Nuala Hampson: Pharmacy Lead, Centre for Sustainable Healthcare 

Nuala Hampson is a pharmacist and educator. She sets strategy for sustainable pharmacy initiatives and facilitates the Net Zero Leadership training and sustainable healthcare courses. Nuala has over 20 years’ experience of clinical pharmacy in primary care and over 15 years’ experience in postgraduate pharmacy education. She is a member of Pharmacy Declares, a group of climate-conscious pharmacy professionals in the UK and joint lead of the Greener Primary Care Pharmacy Association. She co-chairs the national Sustainability in Pharmacy Education group.

• Catherine Richards: SusQI Programme Lead – Academy and Courses, Centre for Sustainable Healthcare

Cath leads the SusQI programme for the SusQI Academy and courses/​ education. She launched the Academy for CSH and is developing the service to provide the biggest benefits to members. Cath has undergraduate degrees in Human Psychology BSc and Occupational Therapy BSc. She has worked in the NHS within adult community mental health teams as an Occupational Therapist before moving into roles within Clinical Governance and Quality Improvement. Catherine has completed the IHI Improvement Coach and Improvement Advisor training.

Q Exchange is our funding programme that offers up to £40,000 to member-led improvement projects in a collaborative process that draws on the knowledge of the community to refine, develop and vote on proposals.