Healthcare Sustainability Champions

Anesthesia has a unique opportunity to significantly reduce the environmental impact, cost, and carbon footprint of surgical care. Dr Praveen Kalra has been systematically improving the environmental sustainability of the Stanford Medicine Interventional Platform through engagement, collaboration, and quality improvement.

Dr. Kalra’s first sustainability initiative was the elimination of Desflurane, a potent greenhouse gas, from the Anesthesia cart. In the process he engaged every Anesthesiologist and department Leadership around sustainability, an exercise that led to the development of the Anesthesia Green Team: the first Green Team at Stanford Health Care.

Dr. Kalra is an educator and advocate for best practices. In this role, he has educated on sustainability during numerous grand rounds, developed a Green Rotation for residents in the OR, and has presented at national conferences on the environmental impacts of surgical care.

The Anesthesia Green Team has developed a guiding strategy, prioritizing initiatives that are achievable and have measurable impact. The team has introduced reusables, collaborated with EVS on hazardous waste reduction, and started Blue Wrap recycling. Dr. Kalra also assists other departments to address waste in their area of influence.

Dr. Kalra has further reduced the cost and carbon footprint of anesthesia care by completing a quality improvement initiative that prevents propofol waste by allowing anesthesiologists to easily calculate the total dose needed for each case. Building on the success of these initiatives, Dr. Kalra is now evaluating opportunities to reduce waste of nitrous oxide gasses in the hospital.