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. 

Il ruolo chiave della pianificazione urbana nella promozione dell’attività fisica

L’inattività fisica, concorrendo ad arrecare numerosi effetti nocivi sulle patologie croniche, è responsabile di oltre 5 milioni di morti annuali. Per questa ragione è considerabile come una pandemia (1). Ciò, associato ad un’esponenziale crescita della popolazione,...

Connecting with nature as homework in physiotherapy – A Bsc thesis reflection

There is rarely a day when I don't go out, because I feel like my body really calls for it. Physiotherapy starts within us, within you, within yourself. If you feel tension right now you might be better off scrolling to the next picture and put the words into...

Allied Health Professionals as agents for change: Chief Sustainability Officer’s Clinical Fellow

Over the last 10 years or more, many of us have been gradually moving towards more sustainable choices in our personal lives. Choosing greener modes of transport, making more plant-based food choices, embracing pre-loved clothing and shopping more locally. There is a...

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...

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