Advancing an environmentally responsible physiotherapy

 

The world faces complex and interrelated crises… Climate change, biodiversity loss, pollution, rapid urbanization, geopolitical conflict and militarization, demographic change, population displacement, poverty, and widespread inequity create risks of future crises even more severe than those experienced today. Responses require investments that integrate planetary, societal, community and individual health and well-being (WHO 2021 Geneva Charter for Wellbeing)

 

 The impact of human activities on our planet’s natural systems has been intensifying rapidly in the past several decades, leading to disruption and transformation of most natural systems. These disruptions in the atmosphere, oceans, and across the terrestrial land surface are not only driving species to extinction, they pose serious threats to human health and wellbeing. Characterising and addressing these threats requires a paradigm shift (Myers, 2017)

Action at the level of direct drivers of nature decline, although necessary, is not sufficient … a sustainable global future’ is ‘only possible with urgent transformative change that tackles the root causes: the interconnected economic, socio-cultural, demographic, political, institutional, and technological indirect drivers behind the direct drivers (Diaz et al., 2019)

About

An international community of academics, clinicians, practitioners and students interested in exploring and advancing the field of environmental physiotherapy. 

Blog

Follow our latest musings on environmental physiotherapy. Ideas, inspiration, news, publications, events, and more. 

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Become part of the first international community of physiotherapists with an interest in researching, developing, and practising physiotherapy at a planetary scale. 

Resources

A growing selection of resources carefully selected by members of the EPA to inspire your thinking and practice of environmental physiotherapy. 

Seeing as caring part two: Deliberate

In science, we use large datasets to learn things. Single-case studies are placed low on the pyramid of evidence and are valuable, but are nevertheless overlooked in critical decisions, such as when to approve a new medication or develop clinical practice guidelines....

15 ways to practise environmental physiotherapy

As we embark on the journey of developing and practising an environmentally responsible physiotherapy, it seems of paramount importance to recognise that we are not setting out in a vacuum. There is a considerable number of quite readily available approaches for...

How do you touch an impossible thing?

Here’s a question to ponder: When you think about the physical therapies — touch, movement, exercise, electrotherapy, hydrotherapy, and so on — do you naturally think about one human doing something to or for another? If you do, you’re not alone, because almost the...

Restoring harmony – How pacific indigenous knowledge can help physiotherapists navigate environmental responsibility

It is a privilege to contribute to the conversation of how the physiotherapy profession could, and should, embark on critically evaluating its relationship with the natural environment. In doing this, I draw on the knowledge of my forbears, particularly in Samoa, to...

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