13:05:30 To to have the map as should be coming up in the chat right now.
13:05:36 I also invite you to learn more about the 2094 calls to action put forth by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, the website and access to the report will also be placed in the chat.
13:05:48 Please consider ways that you can, and your personal and professional lives meaningfully and boldly support work towards these calls indigenous communities have a profound reverence for their elders and nature.
13:06:02 There is much that we can learn from their approach and their wisdom, respecting knowledge and knowledge keepers of the past and present. And considering the health and prosperity of future generations, and all ecologies, and every decision.
13:06:17 For decades, we have heard warnings of climate change.
13:06:19 If you're calling from BC, you will have experienced many troubling events over the past five months. The heat don't the tornado floods and landslides.
13:06:29 Our thoughts are with all of those who have suffered in these events.
13:06:34 We know that these climate events do not impact all communities and populations equally among many vulnerable groups we know the health and well being of older adults are at disproportionate risk.
13:06:47 And so forms the focus of our webinar today, the prescription for nature.
13:06:51 I am beyond thrilled that Dr. Melissa lamb and Anna Cooper we've accepted my invitation to speak at to our network, and to tell her the benefits for their product projects for our audience of older adults, and the organizations that serve them.
13:07:07 Thank you so much for being here and for your critical work. I know that you were both in high demand, especially in the wake of current events.
13:07:16 I will say just a few things about these exceptional leaders, and then invite them to share other ways that they would like to introduce himself as a kickoff their presentations.
13:07:25 Dr. Melissa Len is a Vancouver based family doctor she's the president elect at the Canadian Association of physicians for the environment and the founder of the prescription for nature program at the VC Parks Foundation.
13:07:39 She's an on air medical expert and writer for the CBC and CTV, and a clinical assistant professor at UBC Faculty of Medicine and a Cooper Reed, is a social worker with experience working with older adults and community and long term care settings.
13:07:55 She's currently pursuing a PhD at the Institute of Health Policy and Management and evaluation at the University of Toronto and is the president and founder of the emerging leaders for environmental sustainability and healthcare with the Center for Sustainable
13:08:08 health systems.
13:08:10 I'm going to turn it over to Dr. Lam, to, to kick us off.
13:08:27 Sorry, it was having a little brief technical difficulty there thank you so much. Sarah for the setting the stage, and the introduction and the client and just, you know, your words of knowledge and what we're going through right now.
13:08:40 I just want to start off by saying that I am speaking from the unseeded and traditional territories of the Muslim Squamish and slay with two territories that I want to point everyone's attention to what's going on in the north part of our province right
13:08:53 now with the what Sue it in a nation who are currently having to deal with incursions from colonial peoples on their territory as they try to continue to connect themselves to nature, and also prevent their traditional territories from being harmed by
13:09:10 development of the fossil fuel industry. Anyway, as you'll see through this presentation so important for people at every age, and people from every territory and backgrounds be able to connect to nature safely, and also effectively.
13:09:25 And in a deep way during during their everyday lives. And it's important that we continue our work, not only with the VC part temptation but as a larger whole to enable a wide variety people, everyone in these problems to be able to do so.
13:09:39 So as Sarah mentioned, I am the director of prescriptions for the BC parts foundation and i have i've had such such a privilege over the last year. I'm starting in November 2020 when we, when we kicked off this initiative in launching across the country
13:09:53 so we started off launching NBC in November 2020. And then in Ontario and sketch one and Manitoba, which is where Anna is joining me from today and anyway just so grateful to see the momentum of our initiative and how, how much has been taken up by people
13:10:09 across this country.
13:10:11 So I want everyone to start off just by thinking, just to think in one word, how you feel when you're outside in nature and you can feel free to think it to yourself you can put it into the chat.
13:10:22 And just Yep, I'm just curious to see what intuitive sense you get when you're out in nature.
13:10:39 I can just imagine what people are thinking connected, Shelly just said,
13:10:46 Peace and part of something bigger
13:10:50 relaxed and release you can feel free to keep putting those words in there and this is just one of the many word clouds that we created from what people responded to that question in one of in probably over 20 presentations probably close to 25 or 30
13:11:05 that we've done over the past year, about this program and as you can see many of the words that people are bringing up our words that resonate with other people.
13:11:13 And as Sarah mentioned, it's not just this intuitive sense that we get one outside in nature that it's good for us there's also a lot of research to back that up.
13:11:20 So these are just two infographics that I've been given permission to share one of the left from the Canadian Mental Health Association, the one on the right from a group in the US, and as you can see across the lifespan, connecting to nature and spending
13:11:32 time in nature is incredibly good for us. So, for example, it's been shown to increase bone density enhance your immune system function, reduce anxiety and depression reduce symptoms of ADHD and kids, reduce pain responses after surgery and hospitals
13:11:45 improve work satisfaction. There are just an incredible number of health benefits both mental and physical to spending time in nature, and we're going to talk about some of those today and and just the added benefits from a climate and environmental standpoint
13:12:01 of connecting to nature. So we can think of nature prescriptions as a subset of social prescribing. And the reason why it's so important for us as healthcare professionals to to connect patients to resources in their in their environment is because what
13:12:15 we do in health care is really only responsible for about 25% or 20% of health outcomes. So you know I'm a physician.
13:12:23 And as a social worker. We have many nurses physiotherapist psychologists connected with our program, and we like to think what we do is important and it is but really it's the 75% of things outside of our health care system that have the most impact
13:12:35 on people's health. And so if you look at that kind of middle column of words. You can probably imagine that connecting to nature and spending time in nature could positively impact and many of those different factors.
13:12:47 And so we'll talk about the added benefits of connecting to nature over and beyond just kind of the individual health benefits.
13:12:56 So as a someone trained in human biology and as a physician I always think okay like what's the biological basis behind this like why is nature so good for us.
13:13:06 And this this is a part of a webinar or part of a series of webinars that have to do with active aging and a lot of people often ask is it the exercise.
13:13:14 That's actually not the only thing so there are two theories behind why nature so good for brands. The first one is called attention restoration theory.
13:13:21 And when you think about it when you spend time in nature, or when you spend time in cities they're really busy, they're full of lights full of traffic, full of people and obstacles that you have to navigate around and lots of hard edges.
13:13:33 And what this does is it forces us to constantly have to direct our attention to, to navigate around these obstacles, and that tires out our brains and increases fatigue and increases, irritability, whereas when you spend time in nature is a source of
13:13:47 soft fascination so it's interesting, but you don't have to constantly direct your attention over and over again to get around things. And so what this does is it restores powers of attention, it reduces our irritability and fatigue, and the second theory
13:14:00 theory as to why nature so good for our brains is called stress reduction theory. So the theory says that when you have when there's a stressful episode or a stressful time in your life, spending time in nature helps your brain recover faster than in
13:14:13 built environments. And this speaks to how our brains evolved in nature. So when you think about it, when you spend time in highly biodiverse areas it really has everything that we need to survive so it has sources of water, it has food sources heights
13:14:24 that you can climb up to look out to look for predators and look to where your community would be moving next. so really early brands that evolved to love to spend time in nature, survived longer and pass those nature loving jeans on to future generations
13:14:37 So, no, loving nature, feeling more comfortable and nature's really hardwired into our brains from an evolutionary standpoint.
13:14:47 So I want to talk a bit about some of the amazing research behind the health benefits of nature so I'm just going to share some of my favorite studies.
13:14:55 So this one was a study in Toronto, that combined high resolution satellite imagery individual tree data, Ontario Health Study data and self reports of health perception, and after controlling for a number of different factors.
13:15:07 What they found was that 10 more trees per block actually improves people's health perception, similar to an increase in their personal income of $10,000 per year, moving to a neighborhood with $10,000 for your higher median income or being seven years
13:15:19 younger. So as many of us in health care no income and age are two major determinants of health so I thought it was really neat how this study compared was something really easily measurable such as tree cover to to income and age, and I think, you know,
13:15:34 once we all get past a certain age, we remember how we probably felt a bit better seven to 10 years ago so anyway I thought this was a neat to this was a neat study, and it's also Canadian.
13:15:46 I like to study because it speaks to how nature can be viewed as medicine in a very specific sense. So this was a study with kids in Chicago, and they took 17 children with ADHD on 320 minute walks through a city park through a downtown area and through
13:15:58 a residential area. And what they found was that the 20 minute walk in the park actually improve their digits band backwards performance similar to levels and kids with ADHD.
13:16:08 And so you can see on the graph on the right hand side here, this vertical bar. So as you can see the walk in the park, even though they got the same amount of activity as someone walking in the neighborhood or downtown actually improved this, the score
13:16:21 significantly more so just quickly the DSP score you recite a number of numbers in a row, and then the person will recite those numbers back to you as many as they can remember.
13:16:31 And so the higher number of numbers you can recite tells tells you that you're better your attention and your memories better with this kind of math task and anyway when they crunch the numbers, they found that the benefit was similar to the peak effects
13:16:42 of Ritalin or prescription stimulant medication on the participants, so no one is saying that, spending time in nature is going to replace all the effects of prescription medication, but I think it really speaks to how powerful nature can be as an adjunct
13:16:57 for people at every stage of life to improve their attention and improve their mental health.
13:17:03 So I just want you to think of, again, I'm trying to make this presentation a little bit interactive about, about the science so we do have some specific recommendations in our program about how much times people, people should be spending in nature for
13:17:15 the best benefit so I'm wondering if you can put in the chat, what you. So what amount of time you think people report significantly better health and well being after spending that certain amount of time in nature per week is it one hour, two hours,
13:17:27 three hours four hours or five hours.
13:17:39 We can't be interactive because yeah not everybody can send a note to everybody else. So, Okay, you can just do the foyer.
13:17:50 Yeah, well, people are saying one hours, three hours four hours and you know what's funny is the actual answer is two hours. So, and there's evidence behind that.
13:17:58 So this was a study that came out in 2019, and it was a study of almost 20,000 adults in England. And what they found was that their likelihood of reporting good health or high well being, but significantly greater when their nature contact was more than
13:18:10 or equal to two hours per week and this was again after controlling for a number of other factors that would determine health. And they found that those positive associations continued until they hit about 200 to 300 minutes per week.
13:18:24 And so we don't say you know cut your nature time off at two hours if you've hit two hours you'll continue to get those benefits but two hours is kind of a minimum that we're looking for.
13:18:33 When it comes to health and well being.
13:18:36 So the next question is what's the most efficient drop and cortisol levels when does it happen. I'll skip over this interactive part.
13:19:02 least three times per week and for 10 minutes or more. And what they found was that their cortisol or stress hormone levels dropped over 20% more after a nature experience compared to a non nature experience and if you look again on this graph on the
13:19:15 right hand side, you can see that third little red line there is between the 20 and 30 minute mark, and that's where that stress dropped the most rapidly.
13:19:22 So, a lot of us are busy with with multiple obligations in our lives. So if you want to think about how to get the biggest bang for your buck, in terms of nature time, spend it between that 20 and 30 minute mark, and of course more is always better because
13:19:35 as you can see the cortisol continues to drop but if you only have a little time and for 20 minutes.
13:19:42 And a lot of people, you know wonder why would the BC Parks Foundation which is like a parts organization really focusing on health, when it comes to trying to motivate people to get outside and the answer is right there.
13:19:54 The answer is because health is such an effective message for getting people to change their behaviors, so we can take some of some of this some our lessons behind the health message from the research behind climate change, and this was.
13:20:05 I'm just going to present a study that was done, where they surveyed over 7500 participants in five countries across the world, and they they read participants five pairs of statements and ask them which would make them more likely to support policies
13:20:20 tackling climate change so they had a statement that was centered around the economy. Paired with one with health or a statement around the environment, paired with the economy.
13:20:29 And what they found was that when they framed kind of the need to act based on health and environmental framing this actually increased people's support for the policy recommendations.
13:20:40 And in fact, economic framing had no effect on the everyday person. Something else interesting was when they framed the opportunity for for changes, and and and benefits in terms of opportunities, versus in terms of this nasty thing will happen if you
13:20:54 don't, if you don't change, and they actually found the opportunity for me, increase people's support for the policy suggestion, and also focusing on what's happening to people now in the president packs are also more motivating than future impacts to
13:21:07 make a change. And that's exactly what we try to do in our nature prescription program we talked to people about the benefits that they're going to have now in terms of their health and and really this is this is based in science in terms of motivating
13:21:20 more people to change their behaviors and and connect to nature.
13:21:26 So some more information about why connecting to nature is is good for the planet so health care is in fact a major contributor to global carbon dioxide emissions, so anything that improves people's health status like connecting to nature is going to
13:21:39 reduce the burden on the healthcare system and reduce our overall carbon pollution.
13:21:44 If global healthcare were a country it would actually be the fifth highest emitter in the world, and within Canada about almost 5% of our emissions can come from our healthcare system, which is actually the same as the airline industry, which is significant.
13:21:57 So anyway, I think it's pretty important for us to focus on what we can do within our healthcare system and this is one of them. Also, increasing urban nature and natural ecosystems and makes our cities, healthier so not only just connecting people to
13:22:10 nature make people healthier, but also increasing green infrastructure increasing, increasing tree cover will reduce that urban heat island effect which I'll talk a bit more about later.
13:22:20 That makes people sick or when they're exposed to climate effects also having more green services versus hard built surfaces, improves water absorption when heavy rain falls and flooding happens so so be so increasing natural infrastructure again is going
13:22:32 to make us healthier and also our cities as a whole healthier. Also across the lifespan, people who are more connected to nature are more likely to not only protect it, but also to engage in other pro environmental behaviors so the research says that,
13:22:50 that when you're more connected to nature. Not only will you protect what you love, but also your pro environmental behaviors, will extend to for example, saving electricity, increasing recycling advocating on a political level for actions that will fight
13:23:05 climate change. So, I like to think every time that I are one of my over 1000 colleagues across the country who are registered right in nature prescription that we're really doing our bit for the environment as a result.
13:23:18 Also in Granderson the executive director of the UN Environment Program has said that nature is one of the most effective ways of combating climate change and should be part of every country's climate strategy.
13:23:28 So if we fully embrace nature based solutions for climate change, that focus on restoring and expanding and enhancing our natural ecosystems to deal with both environmental and climate and human issues that this could get us over a third of the way towards
13:23:45 our Paris Agreement targets. Currently there's far far less than 30% of the world's climate finance invested in nature based solutions for climate change.
13:23:54 So I think, given how strong our health voice is, if we get behind, if we if we encourage our leaders to invest in these nature based solutions for climate change, we can hopefully close that huge gap between current investments and potential for carbon
13:24:07 reduction.
13:24:10 Alright, so just want to want to speak about the recent heat don't that we saw in June and July that as we know, led to premature deaths of almost 600 people, which is essentially the biggest weather related disaster in in Canadian history.
13:24:28 And so if you look at this map, you can see what the land surface surface temperatures are on a hot summer day, and you can see kind of in this this area here and kind of like the middle to upper right is the is the Downtown Eastside, and that, not surprisingly
13:24:43 is the area in the city which has not only some of the least tree cover in kind of the Greater Vancouver area, but also we saw over 70% of hospitalizations, coming from the Downtown Eastside during the heat dome.
13:24:57 So really, having access to tree cover having access to green spaces and nature is an equity issue, because people who are already marginalized and who already are experiencing the brunt of climate change will experience it even more if we don't increase
13:25:10 nature in our in our environments in an equitable way across the city. And that's something that we really encourage through my work with the, with the Canadian Association of physicians for the environment.
13:25:20 In the end, also part prescriptions is just making sure that we reduce those barriers to nature access and make our cities, healthier by increasing nature in them.
13:25:29 So some of the urban. Some of the benefits of urban greeting include reducing reducing the need for air conditioning because of shade and this lowers energy demand because of reduced air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions trees also remove air pollutants
13:25:44 and sequester carbon dioxide, as I mentioned, green infrastructure reduces stormwater runoff and improves water quality by absorbing and filtering rainwater, and also the numbers have been crunched and every $1 invested in a tree returns an estimated
13:25:58 up to $3 in benefits so really it's a good economic move as well.
13:26:05 to $3 in benefits so really it's a good economic move as well. And I'm really really pleased to report that based on based on the message that we really get put forth as nature being really important not only for a personal health but also planetary health
13:26:18 health that prescriptions were named is essentially the only Canadian case study in the cut 26 recent special report on climate change in health as a way to inspire people to protect and restore nature as the foundation for healthy lives and livelihoods.
13:26:32 So as you can see in that little highlighted area near the bottom they're prescribing nutrient Canada or prx was specifically mentioned in this cup 26 report.
13:26:42 And so if you're interested in our program I would really encourage you to head to park prescriptions.ca I'm going to talk about our nature for starting the program a little bit more now, and it's a really it's not a difficult website to get through it's
13:26:55 pretty concise, it's very practical and it's very visually appealing and easy to read through so I'd encourage you to take a look we have monthly blogs, where we often will interview kind of key thought leaders and movers and shakers in the nature and
13:27:07 health realm to just to share and inspire our audience and also lots of news and practical tips so take a look.
13:27:16 So if you're a health care professional any licensed health care professional can actually register to prescribe nature through our program and as I mentioned last month we actually hit the 1000 subscriber mark which is pretty incredible.
13:27:27 Just for context, the major national nature prescription program in the US to three years to get to one knows and then they have, you know, way, way more way of way higher population that we do so I think we're doing pretty well.
13:27:40 So when you register your if you're a healthcare professional you will get a customized nature prescription file, which you can see on the left hand side there with our standardized recommendation for outdoor time at the top and then a space where you
13:27:53 can work with your with your patient or your client to come up with an outdoor plan, that makes sense for them. And the interesting thing is, it doesn't necessarily have to involve activity although activity is really really good for health as we know
13:28:06 it could be something as simple if your client has mobility issues as sitting outside more or as their family member wheeling them outside to spend time in nature when they visit so anyway it's really customizable and we encourage prescribers to think
13:28:19 about their, their clients capabilities and what they prefer.
13:28:25 On the right hand side you can see one of the different 14 fact sheets that we have broken down by different health condition that speak to the evidence behind how good connecting to nature is for each health condition and also some, some tips, which
13:28:37 will hopefully serve to motivate people to get outside more and give them some practical advice on how to do that.
13:28:44 I just want to give a brief note to another program with the VC part sedation and it's called healthy by nature, and really with prescriptions we're really focusing on health care providers to get them to motivate their patients.
13:28:55 But this is more more of a community based initiative so what healthy by nature does is it, it's another initiative of Ruby's presentation and it connects people to nature through events and experiences and resources designed to make it easier to get
13:29:07 outside and unplugged. So as you can see, there's a picture of the bottom picture there is from one of our first first day hikes was actually a lunar new year hike, that we ran pre pandemic obviously in 2019 where we brought a whole bunch of of Chinese
13:29:22 elders from that we gathered through mosaic BC, up to the top of Mount Seymour for some time in the snow and it was just an amazing experience some of them had never ever been up there and they all loved it so healthy by nature also works with groups
13:29:36 facing barriers to experiencing bc parks in nature through outdoor activities and excursions like like that. Like these elders, and since 2019 participants have spent more than 1900 hours together in nature and we work with a number of different partners
13:29:50 to connect different populations.
13:29:53 Who, who face barriers to nature.
13:29:55 And then finally I just want to mention what an astounding amounts of media coverage we've had since we launched in November, we There are dozens of newspaper articles TV spots radio interviews that our team across the country.
13:30:11 In all the provinces where we've launched have participated in and I think the momentum is growing and growing and this is a concept I think that really speaks to how people have have not only connected to nature during the pandemic but but again that
13:30:24 intuitive sense we had even before the pandemic that nature was good for us. So I encourage you to, again, stop by our website, or listen listen on the radio and it will read you watch TV and maybe you'll see us Come, come on, sometime soon but yeah thank
13:30:38 you thank you so much for listening and I'm excited to see where we're going to go.
13:30:46 Amazing Thank you Dr. Lam, for that for that overview.
13:31:02 You've given us all a lot to think about and I just wanted to clarify for anybody who was trying to send chat to me during and questions to me during the list is talk, and I apologize I can't receive them but Arielle can area that the activating society
13:31:10 can so send them his way he'll make sure they arrive to me in time for the q amp a.
13:31:15 And I'm going to pass it over to you to share your screen and take us through some of what you have to share.
13:31:21 Well thank you, Sarah.
13:31:25 Okay.
13:31:40 Okay. Can you guys see full screen right now.
13:31:44 Yeah, perfect. Okay, great.
13:31:46 Hey everyone, so I get to talk to you more specifically about nature prescribing and older adult populations, which I'm really excited about.
13:31:57 So just a little bit more about me. Hi, I'm Anna, I'm really excited to be here. Sarah gave a wonderful introduction but I am a social worker and, yeah, typically my experiences has been with older adults, work with dementia, and I work in long term care,
13:32:17 and most of my research is in long term care in aging so I'm really excited to be here and get to talk to you guys and hopefully learn something from you later on.
13:32:29 And, and so I joined PARX actually pretty recently it was over the summer when I moved back to Manitoba, I've been living in Ontario for school pandemic was actually really hard on me to most things when virtual and I'm an outgoing social person, and
13:32:50 to have to spend most my time alone behind a computer I found it really difficult. So when I moved back home.
13:32:58 I kind of reach out to Dr. Lemon was like, I want to bring this program to Manitoba, so beautiful here being outside and getting to spend my summer in the white Shell has been huge for me.
13:33:12 And I want other people to experience this and I think the health care community would really value nature prescription here. So it's been an incredible experience being part of prx and yeah I'm so excited to get to do these presentations and talk about
13:33:28 it more.
13:33:32 So let's talk about nature prescribing and older adults, so I'm going to take you down to a very narrow population narrow but exciting population and one I love to work with.
13:33:45 And so I think there's lots of benefits for both adults older adults and Melissa mentioned some for children as well but today let's talk about older adults.
13:33:55 So, this is overall some of the reasons why I think it's beneficial for this population and what I'm going to do after this is I'm going to take you through a few studies sort of like Melissa did some of my more favorite ones, just to talk to you about
13:34:12 things more specifically, but if any of these things in particular interest you and I didn't really go into details on them. You can email me, we can provide my contact info at the end.
13:34:25 All of it is on the PARX website but I'm happy to share resources or informations or studies related to more of these.
13:34:34 So why should someone like a licensed health care provider prescribed nature to older adults can help control your blood pressure creases someone's happiness connects you to others.
13:34:47 I think that's really important social isolation can be a huge issue for some older adults, still at home or in the community we know social isolation is an issue so I think this is really important, reduces your risk of chronic disease keeps your mind
13:35:06 sharp increases your life expectancy and can reduce your risk of chronic respiratory diseases.
13:35:15 So let's talk about happiness first. I think this is important in any population, but I wanted to talk about it because I think it's interesting, and the study that I'm going to link us to.
13:35:28 There's actually two. And so, they were both done for the Nature Conservancy of Canada, and one. The first one was conducted in 2010. So this is a while ago.
13:35:41 And back then, nine and 10 Canadian adults, said that when they're connected to nature they feel happier.
13:35:50 And then, I think, so this survey also found that 85% of Canadians indicated they were worried that natural areas will not be here for their children and grandchildren, and yeah so this was back in 2010 so that's really telling to me, and especially what's
13:36:08 going on right now, we're in a climate crisis, we're still in a climate crisis and this isn't the first time we're hearing about this. So now jump to the pandemic.
13:36:19 They did a similar survey and again nine out of 10 Canadians say they value nature more than ever before.
13:36:26 94% of Canadians indicated that spending time in nature has helped to relieve the stress and anxiety of the second wave of the pandemic.
13:36:37 With more than 85% believing nature to be important to maintaining their mental health.
13:36:43 So, we like nature. I think it makes us feel good. You knew that a while ago we know it now and especially with Kobe when we need to be outside. We know the climate crisis is real.
13:36:58 I mean I think before maybe we weren't feeling it the same way we are now because it's actually happening in Canada, and it was before but now we're seeing it in major cities and it's it's scary.
13:37:12 And so this is important so I know that took a dark turn but I think the point that I'm trying to say is, I think we want to be connected to nature and makes us feel good.
13:37:22 and let's do it for the planet as well.
13:37:27 So, this was interesting to me because I work in dementia so I you know that that's sort of something that I'm interested in.
13:37:37 And a population I like to work with and I thought this was an interesting study. So this is about keeping your mind sharp. So this is from a longitudinal cohort study so that means it's a study that follows a large group of people so population from
13:38:07 a period of time to many years later, and so it's something we do in health services research a lot to see changes over time. So this was a cohort study done in Australia, and they followed over 2000 adult men and women so who were 60 plus these urban
13:38:14 urban dwellers so they were living in community. And when they were first assessed, they were initially free of cognitive impairment. And so the main outcome measure, so what the scientists were looking for was admission to hospital or nursing home with
13:38:30 a diagnosis of dementia.
13:38:32 So they followed these people to see who that happened to and along the way they were looking for other risk factors for dementia.
13:38:40 And so, really important. Of course, but what was really interesting one of their main findings, was that older adults who garden, reduce their risk of dementia by 36%.
13:38:55 And this was actually even more than walking every day, particularly for women.
13:39:02 I think that's really interesting. I actually did a review a long time ago, community gardening and older adult populations, which I think is so cool just in reducing social isolation, other things for your mobility, but it's really cool.
13:39:18 This is like a great way we're seeing nature prescribing or things you could do as a nature prescription gardening, and it can reduce your risk of dementia.
13:39:29 So I think this was a really cool study. That's why I included it.
13:39:44 So the author suggests that wild gardening may be a protective measure so as in protects you from dementia, potentially, it should also be something we can consider using as a leader activity to promote older adult mental health in general.
13:39:50 So they suggest not only should you do it as something protective but to continue to do it for your mental health, which goes hand in hand with nature prescribing so this is an option of course.
13:40:05 And then another interesting finding was that impaired respiratory function is also a strong and consistent predictor of dementia. So as we know, nature prescribing actually one of the benefits, is it can reduce your risk of chronic respiratory diseases.
13:40:23 So being outside is important connecting to nature is important and I think this study tells us a lot about that.
13:40:33 Okay, This was another cool study about increased life expectancy. So, the authors or the scientists they wanted to study the association between public green spaces and longevity, so like lifespan of urban dwellings senior citizens so these were senior
13:40:54 citizens still living at home in sort of mega city. It was Tokyo.
13:41:14 Again, it's a longitudinal cohort study so they were able to study people over a long period of time. And so this one was over 3000 adults, huge cohort.
13:41:15 And they were initially followed. So from 1992 to 1997, and they did this by having them answer a survey in 1992, and then another one in 1997. And so, They found that older adults who reside closer to walkable green spaces, live longer, no matter what
13:41:36 your age, general health or income is, so basically they can controlled for socio demographic factors which is good because this means that, you know, it didn't really matter your income, it can still help you to live longer, so I thought this was really
13:41:54 cool.
13:41:57 And you know, then they suggest greenery filled public areas that are nearby and easy to walk in should be further emphasized in urban planning for the development and redevelopment of densely populated areas and omega city.
13:42:13 So not only do I think this is a cool study but I actually think it's important and something I've done lesson, but you know for folks that live downtown and high rises so maybe low income housing.
13:42:26 They might not have access to this the same way someone living in a community like a house May. So I think what they're trying to say is, we should think about this when we plan our cities and if you have older adults living in an institutional setting,
13:42:43 you know, high rises, where is their access to nature going to be where the walkable green spaces or the parks, and I know for me, I live in Winnipeg and downtown Winnipeg there's not a lot of this.
13:42:58 So for an older adult living in a high rise and downtown when a pig.
13:43:02 They're not going to have access to this, in the same way that someone living in river heights, which is a neighborhood, just outside of downtown would.
13:43:13 So something we need to think about.
13:43:17 All right. So just a quick case study I want to just tell you a quick story normally I do this with people, but I just wanted to give you an example of how to prescribe nature for someone so Janice is an 81 year old retired teacher who has an extended
13:43:35 post op stay after a heavy collect to me. So that's the surgery where you remove part of your colon and has been discharged back to her nursing home. The nurse in charge reports that she has been walking, waking more often at night confused, more agitated
13:43:52 during the day since she returned home. She has a daily visits from her son in the evenings, who will typically set with her in her room and watch TV together as they chat.
13:44:04 So what's important about nature prescribing when you talk to your clinician about it is, as a clinician, I should be talking to my patient about what a connection to nature looks like for them.
13:44:18 So for me, it might, it's likely like a hike or a walk.
13:44:23 But for someone else it might be sitting on a park bench. And in this case, I'm trying to think of ways that Janice can connect to nature. She lives in a nurse, nursing home, and if she's a bit confused she's post surgery I might be concerned about falls,
13:44:40 but she has an opportunity to meet with her son in the evenings, and they typically spend time chatting, while watching TV. So I actually did this case study with a group of nurses just a week ago.
13:44:54 And we talked about different ways we could prescribe nature. First off, it would be a conversation with Janice and her son.
13:45:02 You know wouldn't just be my idea, but perhaps in the summer months when it's not too hot outside or not too cold, instead of sitting in front of the TV, Janice and her son could sit outside on a park bench, or on a bench hopefully this nursing home is
13:45:19 close to some nature maybe a tree, and they could have their conversation there.
13:45:25 But then a nurse mentioned to that. There's a lot of VR now that's been introduced in nursing homes or, you know, you can go on YouTube and find like a nature scene, so if they needed to be inside perhaps there's like a virtual way of connecting her to
13:45:43 nature while they have their chats, so maybe through VR on YouTube or maybe there's a TV program that has a big emphasis on nature. So you can be creative here and maybe when Janice is feeling better she can do some walking outside with her son.
13:46:00 But I think most importantly, it's got to be a conversation with Janice and maybe her son.
13:46:16 Okay, so are we are we at the end.
13:46:22 You got a couple more minutes. Okay, great. Yeah.
13:46:30 We almost done.
13:46:28 Take your time. Okay, so I just Melissa is already directed you guys to the website but I will say, as well. it is very user friendly it's great it's full of resources.
13:46:39 So there's actually a whole PDF, that's dedicated to older adult health, which is where I got a lot of the information I just provided you with, but go to it, it's not just a prescriber that can look at this you can look at it as well.
13:46:58 So I just want to end off talking a bit about climate change and older adult health because we talked about nature prescribing and how it can be beneficial for you, and an older adults in the community.
13:47:07 But, you know, given what's going on right now I think it's important we address the climate crisis and talk a bit about climate change, and just hit home some of the concerns I have for this population, why I think this type of work is important.
13:47:26 So, unfortunately. Now, everyone will be affected by climate change at some point in their lives.
13:47:33 However, there are various reasons that why, for some folks, they might be more effective, and the impact might be greater. And so, older adults. And the reason this is because it can because of income, where you live, your health.
13:47:50 And so, for older adults, they can be more vulnerable to the risks of climate change because just normal changes in the body associated with aging, that can impact our mobility, we're more likely to experience chronic health conditions at an older age,
13:48:09 and we experienced weekend or depreciated immune systems that older age.
13:48:15 So, the impacts that we need to worry about.
13:48:21 I've listed a few but extreme heat, for sure. So, higher temperatures been linked to increases in hospital admissions illness and death, particularly for older adults with congestive heart failure diabetes or other chronic health conditions for air quality
13:48:42 worsens respiratory conditions which can be common and older adults so COPD or asthma air pollution increases our risk of heart attack.
13:48:55 And, you know, changing weather patterns and wildfires and I know you guys have experienced wildfires and BC. I've experienced them in the prairies recently the summer, it was really bad out here.
13:49:08 It was really bad out here. And, and this raises the amount of pollution does smoke in there which of course, is very hard for folks who COPD or asthma.
13:49:20 And then, I want to think about extreme weather events, and I know this hits close to home. But, older adults are actually more likely to suffer from storm and flood related fatalities.
13:49:33 This could be because of mobility, where you live, if you lived in institutional setting.
13:49:40 Because extreme weather requires evacuation.
13:49:44 And if mobility is a challenge.
13:49:47 This could be really hard on the older adult population so I typically work in long term care. And I think about that all the time. How would you evaluate a group of older adults, some with dementia from long term care setting but same goes for folks
13:50:04 who may live in a high rise, so this is a huge problem.
13:50:08 Even if you live at home and mobility might be an issue for you and extreme weather events. This is scary.
13:50:17 Yeah. And, of course, like a power outage can affect any medical equipment.
13:50:24 And then, lastly, I'm almost there.
13:50:27 So vector borne diseases.
13:50:30 That's like something from ticks, or mosquitoes. So, West Nile Lyme disease and contaminated water, and I think really the message is that for someone with a depreciated immune system any of these are going to impact you more.
13:50:49 So, I just think that this is something we need to care about and I know Melissa has already said this, but let's reconnect with nature and let's protect it better.
13:51:02 The time is now.
13:51:04 And then I guess I'll just let Melissa end off with calls to action and then Sarah it's going to take over.
13:51:12 Thanks so if you're feeling inspired after we talk. These are just a few things that you can do so the first one is spend at least two hours in nature, each week and at least 20 minutes each time, like we recommended our program for optimal mental and
13:51:26 physical health, also spread the word to your doctor and other health professionals about prx any again any licensed health care professional can prescribe.
13:51:33 So the more who are clued into our message and the more who are connecting their clients and patients to nature the healthier we will all be, and also something that we're doing right now with the DC Park sanitation is trying to reduce those barriers
13:51:44 to nature connection so we're looking for community partners who know either nature based event organizations or venues, to see if they're willing to for example provide people who have been prescribed nature with discounts to admission, or even free
13:51:58 passes for example, there's some exciting announcements coming out in the new year about different partners, including both national partners and local partners we're, we're going to be working with.
13:52:09 So if any of you know anyone who would be willing to extend something like that, let us know. And then finally donate, so a lot of the work that we do I know the work and it does the work that I do.
13:52:18 It's a lot of volunteer work to be honest and I mean it's wonderful. This is like, I think like my life's work is to connect people to nature but it does require stuff it does require fun so if you feel moved to donate please donate to the BC Parks Foundation,
13:52:33 or the Canadian Association of physicians, for the environment. Thank you so much.
13:52:38 Thank you. Thank you both so much.
13:52:42 And I'm just going to pop up.
13:52:46 Thank you both so much for your time and your wisdom. I'm just going to pop into the chat, a blog by some of our colleagues at the activation research team benches are like porches and it really connects to your, some of the ideas you were sharing around
13:53:03 how to connect to nature.
13:53:05 When you're living in an urban setting and and just the benefits of getting getting outside.
13:53:13 When you can and I know a number of our choose to move participants on the call today have chosen gardening, as part of some of their activities to keep them active and and socially connected so great to see some of the evidence around there and thank
13:53:28 you for calling out some of the health concerns that older adults should keep in mind and consult their GPS with, and I hope everybody considers talking to their GP on how they can get a prescription for nature and and keep active and in green space,
13:53:45 we don't have very much time for questions we will answer a couple of them in our follow up email so the ones that we weren't able to get to.
13:53:54 But I did want to pose, either to you Dr Lambert to Anna.
13:54:00 There was one question that came in around, do you have any suggestions for nature based experience experiences for people who are maybe facing some barriers to getting outside mobility barriers, when getting outside every day or, or maybe every week
13:54:16 isn't always feasible. Do you have any workarounds for them.
13:54:20 Yeah, and I think Anna mentioned this in her presentation, there are so many different creative ways that we can bring nature to people who have trouble getting to nature.
13:54:29 So one thing I want to say first is there's this this 330 300 principle in terms of trees and it's this kind of growing international trend to make sure that everyone who lives anywhere can see at least three trees from their window.
13:54:43 And there, there's at least 30% tree cover in their cities and they're no further than 300 meters from a park. So I think just being able to look outside of our windows there is research showing there are some significant positive health benefits just
13:54:55 from seeing it. But we can do other things like bring houseplants into people's rooms. We can even nature sounds, there's research showing that just playing birdsong can improve mental health outcomes.
13:55:08 I was speaking with some different physicians who work in hospitals, about, like, Anna mentioned the virtual reality stuff like kind of giving in patients those those experiences through looking through a headset and listening at the same time so we just
13:55:22 need to be creative, and then one more thing I want to emphasize is that nature is what you make of it in many ways. So in some of the studies that we cited.
13:55:31 They asked people to kind of spend time in nature in a self defined way they didn't say, you have to be in the backwoods, you have to be on the side of a mountain they just said, spend somewhere where you feel like you've had a meaningful experience in
13:55:43 nature. And so if we can change our concepts of what nature is realizing that we can find it possibly in a plant on our window so we can find it in a community garden, we can find it in a corner Park, then we can really read those health benefits.
13:55:59 Sick and any I mean, many of these suggestions that you've just provided would apply for the winter setting but any specific suggestions for, you know, the many Canadians and in British Columbia to come in to her about to embark on on winter.
13:56:17 especially I think that one. And and I will also say there were a few questions to around, folks who are may be experiencing some concerns about false and false risks.
13:56:28 So any suggestions.
13:56:30 Yeah, so I think it's, you know, Melissa just listed a whole bunch and I think that it's all about being creative, so for some people it's going to be different than others but I would suggest like it falls.
13:56:46 That was like Janice but case study I said I was worried about her and falls so I would prefer that she's possibly sitting down somewhere. So I really like the nature sounds I actually list them all the time so that's a really great one even when you're
13:57:01 just walking around the house or doing chores, anything I think that's great.
13:57:07 But there's so many ways we can access it Now like I said, YouTube, you can find so many clips on YouTube. Now, just like you know how there's that fireplace.
13:57:17 Like a forest scene.
13:57:20 And I used to I try when I worked with older adults.
13:57:23 I try to bring in plants into their room.
13:57:27 And that works for me to.
13:57:31 Well, wonderful I am, we're at about two minutes to two and I think this is probably a good time to close off, I want to offer a huge thank you to Dr lab, and, and, and a Cooper read for for your time and and for everybody who joined her call today.
13:57:52 And please, you know, consider can continue supporting the work to keep people in your life, healthy and and and think about those ways that you can promote the health of our planet and the nature around us.