Earth Day 2025: What’s new from BC Renal and our provincial network

01/04/2025

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Happy Earth Day 2025! With Planetary Health a foundational principle of the 2023-2028 BC Renal strategic action plan, and Earth Day on April 22, we are pleased to share these recent developments and opportunities:

Actionable BC Renal planetary health strategy now available

BC Renal’s new strategy for planetary health provides an actionable plan to integrate environmentally sustainable kidney care (ESKC) in BC Renal committees and key activities. Guided by a working group of clinical champions from all regional health authority renal programs, an Indigenous leader, patient and family partners, and BC Renal staff, the strategy outlines key priorities, objectives, and how network members can work together to advance efforts. See: BC Renal Planetary Health Strategy

Province Wide Rounds webinar for health professionals and patient partners

Introducing BC Renal's Planetary Health Strategy (and other updates!)

Fri. May 2, 7:30-8:30 am
Presenters:

Dr. Caroline Stigant, medical lead of planetary health, and Helen Chiu, quality lead of patient-centred performance improvement

Learning Objectives:

Gain insights into the latest literature on environmentally sustainable kidney care (ESKC)
Learn about BC Renal's new planetary health strategy, and its potential to support embedding ESKC in practice
Apply accessible, actionable 'reduce' ideas to enhance sustainability in daily clinical practice
Review existing ESKC resources to support readiness for future accreditation

Nephrologist, patient, and kidney donor start sustainability conversations

In an article published earlier this year in the Canadian Journal of Kidney Health and Disease, nephrologist Caroline Stigant, kidney patient Nancy Verdin, and living kidney donor Agnes Black share their perspectives on environmental sustainability. Collectively, they cover the call for climate action as well as improvement ideas and missed opportunities with dialysis and kidney donation processes and experiences. See: Environmental Sustainability Is Needed in Kidney Care: Patient, Donor, and Provider Perspectives - Nancy Verdin, Agnes Black, Caroline Stigant, 2025

Planetary health in action: Fraser Health hemodialysis sites reduce waste of IV iron sucrose administration

In this CASCADES feature, Ada Chiu of Fraser Health Kidney Services succinctly explains the “Why, How, and Now” of all eight of their hemodialysis sites following through on a quality improvement initiative that resulted in reducing waste by 129 kg/month (1,548 kg/year) and improving staff experience in hemodialysis care. See Using QI to change IV iron sucrose administration at hemodialysis sites - CASCADES Canada Also see Fraser Health’s feature of this and other initiatives: Renal program achieves key planetary health milestones.

More information and resources:

See BC Renal’s Planetary Health page.