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. 

Join

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. 

Launching the environmental physiotherapy education inspiration-base

As I am writing this, the lands and people of this world are being ravaged by yet another war, adding, what feels like, crisis upon crisis upon crisis. The crisis in Syria is still ongoing. Last year, the IPCC issued its starkest warning about global warming yet....

Are Forestry Methods Relevant for Physiotherapists?

Many physiotherapists recommend that their patients actively use nature to aid in recovery. It is important to engage in primary prevention and health promotion efforts to secure easily accessible natural spaces, such as old, pristine forests. This may include...

A physiotherapist by profession, an environmentalist by passion

I was born and raised in Malta, a small island found in the middle of the Mediterranean that is hit with extreme currents from the North (coming from Greece and Italy) and South (from Libya and Tunis). Experiencing an island life, I always felt very close to the sea,...

Sommerhitze: Eine Gefahr für Ihre Patient*innen? Physiotherapeut*innen für Gesprächsrunde gesucht

Gemeinsam mit meinem Forschungsteam forsche ich zu Gesundheitsschutz bei Hitzeextremen in Deutschland (Projekt HAP-DE - Analyse von Hitzeaktionsplänen und gesundheitlichen Anpassungsmaßnahmen an Hitzeextreme in Deutschland, gefördert vom Umweltbundesamt). Fallstudie...

If you have any thoughts, ideas or questions about environmental physiotherapy,
we would love to hear from you anytime

10 + 12 =