We were delighted to bring the new themes within the 6th Edition Guidelines and Principles for the Development of Health and Social Care standards to life in the first instalment of the new ISQua EEA Webinar series!
The first ISQua EEA webinar, Focus on Sustainability, thoroughly explored the new sustainability requirements, offering valuable insights from leading organisations actively integrating environmental considerations into healthcare delivery. Elaine O’Connor, Head of Operations at ISQua EEA, opened the webinar and chaired the discussion.
Nicola McCauley-Conlan, ISQua EEA’s Senior Accreditation Manager, introduced the new Sustainable Care Principle. This Principle encompasses seven new criteria addressing the need for care providers to conduct strategic reviews of their environmental impact, engage staff and patients, ensure governing body oversight, practice responsible resource stewardship, address non-renewable energy use, assess carbon footprints, and enhance emergency planning.
Thomas Dakin, Programme Lead, the Geneva Sustainability Centre, highlighted the urgent need for the healthcare sector, which contributes 4 – 6% of global carbon emissions, to transform its practices. The Geneva SustainabilityCentre empowers hospital leaders with the information, tools, and skills to achieve low-carbon care, enhance quality, build climate change resilience, and address health determinants. Their Sustainability Accelerator Tool, an online dashboard, assesses hospital sustainability across 23 indicators. A cornerstone of their work is the Global Health Impact chapter for accreditation standards, developed in collaboration with Joint Commission International (JCI). This chapter, available for licensing, focuses on integrating sustainability into hospital strategy, engaging staff, monitoring resource use and decarbonising operations, reducing supply chain impact, and developing resilience plans.
Thaira Al-Madi, CEO for Technical Services at the Healthcare Accreditation Council (HCAC), in Jordan, shared HCAC’s impressive journey. HCAC actively integrates sustainability into Jordan’s national Economic Modernisation Vision. Their accreditation framework aligns with the WHO goals for climate-resilient healthcare by identifying gaps, building staff capacity, and monitoring achievements. HCAC believes accreditation is crucial for establishing safe environments, robust infection prevention, effective environmental safety, and responsible medication and inventory management, all of which contribute to waste reduction. HCAC has revised its hospital accreditation standards to mandate a strategic “Green Hospital Programme” with defined objectives, staff training, and monitoring of waste and energy consumption. HCAC was also the first accreditation body to license the Geneva Sustainability Centre’s Global Health Impact chapter.
Gilvane Lolato, Operational Manager at Organização Nacional de Acreditação (ONA), in Brazil,detailed their systematic approach to sustainability. ONA is preparing to launch a new manual in January 2026 that emphasises environmental, social, governance principles within leadership. The new ONA manual will feature specific requirements to embed sustainability into governance and strategic planning, incorporate environmental criteria in infrastructure projects, encourage carbon footprint assessment, strengthen waste management, develop environmental risk mitigation plans, and ensure effective communication of sustainability strategies. ONA’s multi-level accreditation methodology allows organisations to adopt a phased journey towards full implementation.
The Focus on Sustainability webinar discussion demonstrated that sustainability is intrinsically linked to patient safety and quality of care. Integrating sustainability requirements into existing standards, rather than treating them as standalone initiatives, was highlighted as a key strategy for effective implementation, weaving them into the core operations and governance of healthcare organisations. The journey to sustainable healthcare demands leadership commitment, strategic planning, capacity building, and a stepwise approach to support organisations of all sizes.
We are delighted to share the recording of the full Focus on Sustainability webinar with the ISQua EEA network. To listen to the full discussion, you can access the webinar recording HERE.
We are already looking forward to our next instalment in the webinar series: Focus on Digital Care and AI on the 24th June, 1PM (IST). This promises to be another exciting discussion exploring the evolving landscape of digital health and artificial intelligence (AI) in healthcare and how these concepts appear in the recently published 6th Edition Guidelines and Principles for the Development of Health and Social Care standards.
Be sure to secure your spot and register HERE.
