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© Veterinary Business Development Ltd 2025

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1 Mar 2022

Practice is a Paragon of sustainability after award win

Paragon Veterinary Referrals in West Yorkshire has been awarded bronze by Investors in the Environment – and has plans to go for silver and green next.

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Joshua Silverwood

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Practice is a Paragon of sustainability after award win

Dan Kenny, surgical resident at Paragon, with the bronze certificate from Investors in the Environment.

A West Yorkshire animal hospital has been awarded an environmental accolade as it makes adjustments to its practice to become eco-friendly.

Paragon Veterinary Referrals in Wakefield has been awarded a bronze Investors in the Environment (iiE) accreditation for its work in helping to meet a series of ecological goals.

The team at the Linnaeus-owned practice introduced a host of measures including reducing single-use items; replacing disposable theatre hats with fabric versions; using reusable surgical gowns for some procedures; introducing washable kennel liners; and moving to paper-free HR processes.

Collections

The practice also adjusted how patients are fed to reduce the amount of food thrown away, as well as introducing food waste collections.

Ellie West, environmental sustainability lead at Linnaeus, said: “The team at Paragon are quite the overachievers for managing to achieve bronze accreditation within just six months of joining.

“That is our record in Linnaeus, so many congratulations. This is so well-deserved.”

Recycling

At the hospital, recycling bins have also been added to clinical areas and personal bins removed from offices to encourage people to recycle.

All lights have been replaced with LEDs where possible, and the practice has used “Paws to Switch Off” stickers to remind people to turn off lights and computers when not in use.

‘Just the start’

Sophie Adamantos, clinical director at Paragon, said: “This award is just the start. Next, we want silver and, ultimately, we’ll be going for the green award, the highest achievement of them all.

“We’ve worked hard to comply with environmental regulations, and the expectations of the public and our customers.

“We’ve monitored our key resource usage and implemented conservation techniques to achieve our targets. This includes a new waste and recycling policy, and a sustainable procurement policy.

“Most importantly, we’ve circulated our environmental policy to all our employees, ensured they’ve been provided with training to increase awareness of environmental matters, and encouraged them to identify new areas where we can make a difference.”