The former president of the Spanish Society of Hospital Pharmacy (SEFH), José Luis Poveda, has warned about his concern at the fact that many sustainability initiatives promoted in the healthcare system depend on "the added effort of the most committed professionals".
"Ensuring continuity requires time, support, and the ability to make decisions", he said, also emphasizing the need to "explain the results". Along the same lines, other speakers have stressed that "it is necessary to identify indicators, have comparable data, and communicate both progress and difficulties". These reflections have been put on the table in Madrid, during the "I Jornada y Premios AlineadODS. Committed to Sustainability".
The events are framed by the "AlineadODS Project", an interdisciplinary innovation initiative driven by Laboratorios Laphysan and designed and coordinated by EnferConsultty. At the meeting, Conrado Domínguez, co-coordinator of the Sustainability, ESG and SDGs Group of the Spanish Society of Health Executives (SEDISA), also took part, who has argued that healthcare technologies must be assessed "not only for their effectiveness or their economic cost, but also for the balance between the benefits they generate and the resources they consume".
Domínguez has focused on the role of digital tools and has pointed out that "artificial intelligence (AI) is not sustainable by itself, just as it is not unsustainable", to emphasize that if it is to add value, it is essential to "start from a real need, not from a fashion". In his view, "we should opt for the smallest and most efficient model that solves the problem" and "no less important is calculating the footprint across the entire life cycle and its real value, both before and after".
After these interventions, the specialists analyzed the day-to-day of healthcare centers, focusing on how energy and materials consumption, waste generation, supply circuits, or contracting criteria represent key areas to reduce the organizations' environmental footprint. In this context, the deployment of sustainable environmental management in the management units of the Madrid Health Service (SERMAS) has been studied, highlighting the relevance of sharing criteria and having coordination tools that allow sustainability policies to be transferred to the different centers and services.
Another of the blocks has addressed the construction of a culture of sustainability in a tertiary hospital, taking as a starting point the organizational complexity of this type of institutions. As participants have emphasized, "the integration of environmental criteria does not depend only on incorporating new technologies or procedures, but also on involving professionals from different categories, encouraging training, and ensuring that sustainability is taken into account in the usual decisions of each service."
Likewise, emphasis has been placed on incorporating environmental criteria into the public procurement of pharmaceutical products, an area considered strategic due to the high volume of goods that healthcare organizations purchase and consume and due to the capacity that contracting decisions have to influence suppliers and their manufacturing processes.
Recognition of the best initiatives: AlineadODS Awards
Within the framework of the event, the "AlineadODS Awards" were presented, conceived to identify, recognize, and give visibility to projects that are already contributing to the health sector moving toward a more sustainable model. The awards have been structured into four categories: sustainability in the practice of intravenous fluid therapy, training and awareness-raising strategies aimed at healthcare professionals, research and innovation in sustainability, and implementation of sustainable models in institutions participating in the "AlineadODS Project".
In the intravenous fluid therapy category, the Hospital General Universitario de Albacete has been distinguished for its initiative "From intention to clinical impact: transformation of technical competence and ESG criteria in intravenous fluid therapy through the EcoPack intervention in a hospital setting", led by Nuria Jaén Bueno. The work has analyzed a digital training proposal focused on the environmental impact of the containers used in intravenous fluid therapy.
The Hospital General Universitario Gregorio Marañón de Madrid has received recognition for the project "Sustainable culture: awareness, participation, and climate action", coordinated by Ana Cerrillo Martín, which seeks to integrate sustainability into the center's daily dynamics through training actions, workshops, exhibitions, and participatory activities aimed at professionals, patients, and families.
On the other hand, the University of Jaén has been awarded for the study "From knowledge to action: measuring to transform. Environmental awareness, ecological beliefs and sustainable behaviors in healthcare professionals. Sequential mixed-methods study", led by Romina Patricia Olivieri, which delves into the reasons why the environmental commitment of healthcare professionals is not always reflected in sustainable behaviors in their day-to-day practice.
Finally, the University Hospital 12 de Octubre in Madrid has been honored for the project "The hospital’s lung. Institutional model of environmental sustainability in critical and semi-critical patient units", directed by María Delicias Quintana Estellés, which extends sustainability to the critical and semi-critical patient units of the center through a specific institutional model.