Green at Barts Health

We are a voluntary special interest group that all Barts Health staff coin. There are 100+ of us working across the Trust's sites, all concerned about the climate emergency and sustainability.

We are: nurses, doctors, physio's, librarians, managers, pharmacists, educators, dieticians, occupational therapists, play therapists and more. Have a read of some of our members' bio's below for more information.

Our aim is to support and challenge the Trust to achieve its reduction in carbon emissions, and sustainability goals.

Together we are raising our voices and bringing our energy and attention to promote these issues to our leaders, staff, patients and the public. We promote positive behaviour change to improve quality, save money, and care for our environment.

We want Barts Health to become the national leader on NHS sustainability, building on the Trust’s UK-leading sustainability foundations, to emphasise WE CARE about our patients now, as well as their future health and wellbeing, by taking responsibility for looking after the environment in the context of the current climate emergency.

We want Barts Health to declare that this is an emergency, the way Great Ormond Street Hospital for CHildren (GOSH) has done:

We are privileged to support and amplify the work of the Trust's award-winning Sustainability Team! You can find out more about them on the Trust's external website here, read sustainabiliy co-ordinator Lindsey Jarrett's blog post "spotlight on... sustainability and recycling" here.

As Sir Simon Stevens writes in his introduction to Delivering a ‘Net Zero’ National Health Service:

"The burden of coronavirus has been exacerbated and amplified by wider, deep-seated social, economic and health concerns. The right response is therefore not to duck or defer action on these longer-term challenges even as we continue to respond to immediate pressures. It is to confront them head on... One of the most significant is the climate emergency, which is also a health emergency. Unabated it will disrupt care, and affect patients and the public at every stage of our lives. With poor environmental health contributing to major diseases, including cardiac problems, asthma and cancer, our efforts must be accelerated..."

Dr Florence Wedmore, Co-Founder and Chair:

Is currently working as an education fellow and in the geriatrics department at RLH. She went to medical school in Brighton and misses being by the sea. She has long been interested in sustainabilty but when she did a masters in public health she realised how much this is part of her work as a doctor. She finds putting things in bins really hard.
Read Florence's latest BMJ article, "This is climate breakdown, and it is having a real effect on our patients", and listen to her appearance with Anna Moore (below) on UCLPartners' London Simulation Network Podcast discussing sustainability in healthcare.

Tim Martin, Co-Founder:

Critical Care Nurse. 20 years in the NHS, mainly in Critical Care. Grateful to find like-minded health workers who want to ‘Green the NHS’.
 

Charlotte Monro:

“As an occupational therapist (at Whipps Cross) I have always wanted to help people get the most out of their environments, and shape environments to help people get the most out of life. But it was after joining one of the Climate Change protests in London, seeing so many people of all ages and backgrounds- determined to bring about positive change - that I got really motivated on sustainability. Joining Green at Barts Health was the start, and I saw the Whipps Cross Hospital rebuild was the perfect opportunity for local action to make a real difference for the climate – and to apply my years of training in occupational therapy and ergonomics."

Dr Nadia Audhali, Joint Vice Chair:

Paediatric Doctor and mum. 2010 graduate St George’s, London. Based at Whipps Cross Hospital. "Feeling hopeless about climate change until School Strikes and Extinction Rebellion persuaded me that positive action is possible".  Now leading on Green at Barts Health projects including Clean Air Champions (in partnership with Global Action Plan).

Dr Anna Moore, Joint Vice Chair:

Anna Moore is a respiratory doctor, medical educator and mum, working in East London and living in SE London. Climate change and ecological breakdown and the consequences for health are of huge concern to her, both personally and professionally. She is interested in how health professionals start to bring conversations about climate change and sustainability into routine clinical practice, and how we train clinicians to do this.
Listen to the Treating You podcast's episode on Clean Air Day - featuring Anna! You can also read her editorial in the BMJ, A planetary health curriculum for medicine, and check out her presentation on The Climate Crisis, Healthcare & Health. She was recently highly commended as London’s Public Sector Individual Changemaker of the Year at Global Action Plan's Sustainable City Awards 2022.

Dr Zahra Shehabi, Assistant Comms Lead:

Consultant Dentist and mum of 3. 2005 graduate. Based at RLH. "After returning back to work from Mat leave last summer, I was overwhelmed by the amount of waste generated by our clinical practice, hence why I joined GABH and started Envirodent." Zahra was recently a judge on Dragon's Den(tal), has brought reusable masks to the Barts Dental Hospital, features in Greener NHS's latest campaign to raise staff awareness and was shown at COP26 in Futures Lab: Climate-Smart Healthcare for a Healthier Planet video (at 41 minutes). She recently received a  Collaborative Award at the Barts Health Heroes Awards!

Amy Ng, Social Media:

Currently a third year medical student at Barts, Amy helps out with social media to spread awareness about the sustainable projects Green at Barts have undertaken. Having done a module on sustainability in school, Amy has been encouraged to help out with the team to educate the public on how the trust has taken measures to build a more sustainable future in healthcare.

Adam Tocock, Website Co-ordinator:

One of the Trust's librarians serving staff across sites as part of the Knowledge and Library Services team, Adam is currently on secondment at Homerton, though he is usually based at St Barts Hospital. He maintains this website and would like you to get in touch if you would like something featured here, or have comments/queries/complaints.

Tase Oputu, Organiser:

The Lead Pharmacist for Medicines Commissioning and Pathways, Tase spends her time between the Royal London and Whipps Cross Hospitals. The first black woman to sit on the Royal Pharmaceutical Society's Board and Assembly, Tase was instrumental in getting the RPS to declare a climate emergency and divest of fossil fuels. Read more about this in our interview with her.

Fill-in this quick Google form or email us at greenatbarts@gmail.com

By joining you will receive our newsletter and invite to our monthly staff webinar and special talks, you will be able to network with staff in your area/discipline and get support for projects or ideas you have for improvement.

This is what Jackie Sear, accident & emergency staff nurse at the Royal London says about being in the group:

This word cloud summarises our members' feelings about being in the group:

Greener Hospital:

Our involvement with The Whipps Redevelopment Project Sustainability Working Group has ensured green voices are "in the room" at every stage of the Whipps Cross site rebuild, with the ambitious target of the world's first net zero hospital the ultimate aim.

Campaigning:

We're involved with many campaigns including Clean Air Day on Thursday 17/6/21, and have campaigned for cleaner air around our hospitals...

Sustainable Quality Improvement:

Have a look at the projects we've conducted in our SusQi page for more on this concept and a great example in greener eye treatment..

Education and Raising Awareness:

Anna and Florence are ready and willing to talk at your department or team meeting, just get in touch: greenatbartshealth@gmail.com

For St Barts Hospital's sustainability-themed audit day on 15/9/21 Anna gave a very well-received presentation on "The Climate Crisis, Healthcare & Health" that you can view on our news page. In May she gave a talk at a webinar with Climate Acceptance Studios on air pollution from her perspective as a respiratory registrar and a mum in south London. A clip from this talk and others in that series are available here, and the full talk will be released on 8th June.

Our poster from BMJ and FMLM's Leaders in Healthcare Conference 2020 breaks down our approach:

Read Anna's recent editorial in the BMJ, A planetary health curriculum for medicine and listen to her appearance on BMJ's Sharp Scratch podcast, in an episode entitled Planet Earth on Red Alert.

You can also hear Anna and Florence on UCLPartners' London Simulation Network Podcast in an episode titled Sustainability in Healthcare. They talk to host Nicola Stoke, a Medical Education & Simulation Fellow at the Homerton, about the climate crisis and why we need to make changes in healthcare.

Read Florence's recent article on the IPCC report, global warming and local flooding, "This is climate breakdown, and it is having a real effect on our patients", in The BMJ here.

email: greenatbartshealth@gmail.com

Instagram: greenatbarts

Twitter: @greenatbarts

We're also on Whatsapp; get in touch if you'd like to join our thread!

Barts Health staff can access our new pages on the Trust's intranet, WeShare, here.