Philips at CleanMed – closing the loop on the Circular Economy

At this year’s CleanMed Conference in the U.S., Philips, a global leader in health technology, and the international NGO Health Care Without Harm, a leader in the global movement for environmental health and justice, jointly organized an interactive workshop titled ‘Healthcare Transformation towards a Circular Economy Model’. Bringing together representatives from leading Integrated Delivery Networks (IDNs), the session focused on how customers and suppliers of health technology could work together to co-create circular economy solutions.

The workshop clearly identified two distinct IDN groups: those that already embrace the circular economy and are assessing opportunities to implement it, and those that are not yet fully committed but want to know more. Their top two drivers: furthering their sustainability vision/strategy and achieving cost savings. The workshop attendees cited extending the life of medical technology from years to decades through a process of continuous upgrade and improvement as one of the main themes for discussion.

Philips is not only committed to keeping medical technology in hospitals operating at state-of-the-art performance for as long as possible. When the technology finally reaches the end of its useful life, it is committed to implementing a circular economy policy of return, refurbish, repurpose and recycle. That’s not just for the future, it’s already happening. Here we speak to Olesya Struk, Group Sustainability Senior Director, on Philips’ role at CleanMed.