How do you change whole systems to make them sustainable?

That’s a question we increasingly ask ourselves at Forum, and you’ll see more and more about that on this blog in the coming months. Happily, others are asking this question too, and we’ve been really excited to see the NHS Sustainable Development Unit’s (SDU) work around this, asking the same of the health system.

Today sees the launch of Vision for Sustainable Health: A Route Map. This is a collaborative work that has brought together experts from across the health system – from the Royal Colleges and PCTs, to Government Offices, academia, consumer groups and the private sector. The aim is to help map out how sustainable development is integral to health care. The list of involved parties alone reflects the reality that the nation’s health is more than just the concern of the NHS.

“The NHS cannot move to a truly sustainable health system on its own. It needs the support of all organisations associated with health and social care. It also needs the backing of society, patients and staff.” Vision for Sustainable Health

We’ve been fortunate to work with the SDU at different points on this journey. Fit for the Future set out the terrain – four scenarios for the sorts of operating contexts that the NHS could be facing in 2030. The Route Map takes this work further, outlining the next steps towards a sustainable health system, what that might look like and what challenges need to be overcome to achieve it.

Forum helped develop the Route Map by facilitating workshops that supplied the raw material for the SDU to work with. During these workshops, we asked participants to come up with sustainability challenges and generate ideas to solve them.

We identified common themes, such as ‘models of care’ and then asked working groups to set out the sorts of changes needed to move the health system towards sustainability. The workshops were incredibly productive, generating wall-to-wall post-it notes and flipcharts.

The SDU has done a fantastic job of making sense of all the ideas the process generated and have produced a blissfully short report with a small number of clear, simple messages. The central message is that sustainability needs to be at the heart of a successful future health system.

For our part, we will work with the Route Map and explore how to use it to come up with the innovations needed to shift the health system in a sustainable direction. We’re determined to carry on working towards the visions that the SDU have set out, and would love to hear from any who want to join us.