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Positive Pawprint Partner

Positive Pawprint is all about People, Pets and the Planet

Castle Vets Positive Pawprint partner

Positive Pawprint is all about: People (so wellbeing of staff and clients), Pets (Patient care and standards) and the Planet (Being more sustainable and eco friendly where possible)

What does this mean?

In order to become a positive pawprint partner we conducted an environmental impact assessment and created an environmental impact action plan, looking at all the areas in which we could improve what we do for our people, pets and planet.  We then had to ensure that we were doing a number of things to go above and beyond to improve for our people, pets and planet. 

Patient wellbeing

  • Fear free training
  • ISFM Gold cat friendly status (see our Gold cat friendly page for more info)
  • New cat ward with new kennels that are larger, don’t face any other cats and are not made from reflective material
  • Rabbit friendly status
  • Growing fresh herbs and grass for patients such as rabbits
  • Noise ohmmeters to monitor sound levels in cat ward to reduce stress levels
  • Classical music for a calm kennel environment
  • Offering weight clinics
  • A bench for nervous dogs to wait outside

 

Community engagement

  • Working with local animal rescues
  • Working with animal charities

Quality improvement

  • Regular meetings to discuss sustainability
  • Regular meetings to review new research and advanced methods

Infection prevention and control

  • Swabbing of surfaces to ensure the highest cleaning standards
  • Rotation of cleaning products to prevent bacterial resistance
  • Monitoring antimicrobial use

Biodiversity

Creating wildlife habitats:

  • Bug hotel
  • Bird boxes
  • Bat boxes
  • Bee friendly practice
  • Plants for bees
  • Wild bee hive

 

Team wellbeing

  • Monthly staff wellbeing activities such as decorating bird boxes for the practice
  • Trained mental health first aiders
  • Creating relaxing working environments and staff areas

 

Energy and climate

  • LED lighting and automatic lights where possible
  • Paper reduction
  • Reduced number of deliveries from daily to twice a week
  • Huge amount of recycling
  • Rechargeable batteries 
  • Washable scrub hats
  • PPE bins for correct disposal
  • Pharmaceutical waste disposal bins for correct disposal
  • Waste auditing
  • Disposing of lab chemicals in waste bins instead of down the sinks
  • Computers on timers for energy saving overnight
  • Eco friendly product use where possible