Q&A Time: Lessons Learned in Greening Surgical Practice

This lecture discusses Sustainable Surgical Practice, with case examples provided from lessons learned in greening surgical practice. The lecture provides examples of how changes for sustainability can often align with improved patient safety, increased efficiency, and reduced costs. This lecture covers simple changes that have worked and those that were more challenging for the team to embrace. Case examples are included from human and veterinary health care of changes made to reduce the environmental impact of the operating theatre. Topics that will be included are the varying carbon footprint of different medicine preparations (for example oral versus intravenous), improved patient safety when adapting to lower flow anesthesia and use of capnography, improved communications and reduced errors when using reusable surgical scrub hats with name identification, reduced carbon footprint and improved personnel safety with reusable sharps bins, reduced costs and environmental impact from waste segregation, improved efficiency and surgical instrument protection with use of surgical sterilization tins, among many other examples. The lecture also includes tips for positive communication about change.