In this world of lockdowns and working from home it is important to dedicate time to enjoy some exercise in the open air. The benefits of leaving the house for some exercise are two-fold, it is well-known that exercise is good for mental well-being as well as physical health. Going for a walk or spending time in nature helps reduce work stress and improve mental health. Research has shown that simply spending time in natural environments can have beneficial effects on blood pressure and cortisol levels. It is currently wintertime, for those of us in the northern hemisphere, so there is also the incentive to go outside and (hopefully!) feel some sun on our face.
A recent Ipsos poll carried out by Nature Conservancy of Canada showed that 94% of Canadians claim that nature helps them to relieve stress or anxiety. In the same poll, 74% said that spending time in nature is more important now than ever before. The Mental Health Foundation found that 62% of adults in the UK found relief from the stress of the pandemic by going for a walk in green spaces.
Being able to get outdoors is important, especially if it is near our homes. This is more important now for many people who live in a country with restrictions on how far they can travel from home. This is not always easy, with growing urbanisation more green space is lost each year. Cities are places where people can find employment and entertainment on a large scale (in times of reduced lockdowns, of course), but living in a city is also associated with decreased access to nature. This is especially true for individuals in economically deprived urban areas.
A WHO-backed initiative called The Global Business Collaboration for Better Workplace Mental Health was launched on Monday 25th January. Its founding members, including CEOs from Unilever, Deloitte, HSBC and other organisations, urged the business community to prioritise and invest in the mental health of employees. This has been done as companies try to pick-up from the economic fallout of the pandemic.
Will we see in the future doctors prescribing countryside breaks or bosses insisting an employee takes a walk in the park? Well, yes!
In British Columbia, physicians can prescribe patients a recommended two hours a week in nature as part of the parks prescription programme (PaRx). PaRx is Canada’s first national, evidence-based nature prescription programme. In the first few days after its launch, 60 doctors registered as prescribers and the PaRx team plans to expand the programme across Canada in 2021, starting in Alberta.
Scottish doctors have also been able to prescribe nature to their patients. In 2018 doctors in Shetland were authorised to do this in what is believed to have been the first programme of its kind in the UK.
The story does not stop here however as we start to see stakeholders now attempting to generate clinical/real-world based evidence on the usefulness of nature walks or in more general nature-based health interventions, judging from a few registered trials on clinicaltrials.gov by universities of Sheffield and Minnesota.
As the world starts to recover from Covid-19 we might see more and more of these kinds of prescriptions; in fact, they might be a good supporting tool to help people overcome some of the negative effects of lockdowns. Tech companies operating in the health and wellness space could also play an important role here; after all, they are experts in motivating people to move and provide useful tracking tools, ranging from smartwatches to more sophisticated activity trackers. Smart money says that such partnerships would be profitable for all parties involved and would accelerate the positive impact for the end-user at a large scale.
#MentalHealth #Lockdown #FreshAir #GreenSpaces #Outdoors #FreshAirPrescription
Sources
https://www.parkprescriptions.ca/
https://www.psychologytoday.com/intl/basics/environment
https://www.euronews.com/travel/2020/12/30/over-60-of-adults-find-relief-from-covid-stress-in-nature
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0122051
https://betterworkplacemh.com/about/