Welcome back to Be the Expert! The article we are bringing to you today was first published in the journal “Science of the total environment”, in February this year, titled, “California's early transition to electric vehicles: Observed health and air quality co-benefits”. Authors were; Erika Garcia, Jill Johnston, Rob McConnell, Lawrence Palinkas, and Sandrah P. Eckel. In previous episodes, we have spoken about air quality in the urban environment and some of the strategies to mitigate this, including transitioning to electric vehicles. In this study, the authors looked at whether respiratory health and air quality co-benefits are already noticeable at the relatively low levels of zero-emissions vehicles (battery electric, plug-in hybrid, hydrogen fuel cell vehicle) adoption in California.
Dr. Terry O’Connor, Dr. Nuzhat Islam, and MD-PhD candidate Douglas Fritz walk with us through their clinical case highlighting the impact of climate change on arboviral infectious disease. Check out their written case (adaptable for medical school curricula) at Climate Resources for Health Education here: https://climatehealthed.org/course/arboviruses/
Dr. O’Connor is an instructor of Emergency Medicine at the University of Washington and Director of the Diploma in Climate Medicine at the University of Colorado Climate and Health Program. Dr. Islam is a second year internal medicine resident at the University of California in San Diego and a co-founder of the Planetary Health Report Card. Douglas is a second year MD/PhD student at the University of Colorado and one of the vice chairs for Medical Students for a Sustainable Future.
In this episode, we speak with medical student James Sullivan from the Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine at Case Western Reserve University about the process of creating an integrated climate-health curriculum at the medical school.
If you want to learn more, check out this journal article about the Cleveland Clinic’s climate-health curricular design: 10.1097/ACM.0000000000004376
Episode written by Genny Silva, Produced by Natasha Sood, and Edited by Liana Haigis
In this episode, the Code Green team speak with Dr. Heather Whelan, Kelsey Barter, and Hossein Moein Taghavi about the connections between heat, air pollution, and neurodegenerative disease. Dr. Whelan is a Professor of Medicine at University of California San Francisco, Kelsey is a medical student at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, and Hossein is a research assistant at Stanford University School of Medicine. Dr. Whelan, Kelsey, and Hossein wrote this case as part of the Climate Resources for Health Education (CRHE) initiative (Case OSS9.2). Join us as we dive into this patient case!
To learn more about CRHE head over to climatehealthed.org.
Episode written by Genny Silva, Produced by Natasha Sood, and Edited by Liana Haigis
In Episode 10, Adesh speaks to Dr Aletha Ward (co-Founder of Climate Action Nurses (CAN)), who talks about the organisation's role in enabling rapid healthcare decarbonisation through climate education for nurses in Australia.
https://www.climateactionnurses.org/
In our latest show, Marc and Adesh discuss the findings from a scoping Review that was published recently in the journal, 'Neurology'. The article was titled "Impacts of Climate Change and Air Pollution on Neurologic Health, Disease, and Practice". The authors were Shreya Louis, Alise K. Carlson, Abhilash Suresh, Joshua Rim, Mary Ann Mays, Daniel Ontaneda and Andrew Dhawan.
Article: https://doi.org/10.1212/WNL.0000000000201630
In this fascinating episode, tune in to hear from Dr Melissa Frick, who is a chief resident in Radiation Oncology at Stanford University and serves as co-chair on the Greening the Clinics Initiative of the Stanford Healthcare Resident Safety Council. Find out about the exciting initiatives Melissa and her team have been undertaking at Stanford, and what Radiation Oncology can be doing to move towards zero-carbon care.
Resources:
ARRO Climate Health, Equity, and Sustainability Taskforce (CHEST) interest form: https://forms.gle/o6tCvC3xL86trJPi6
NorCal Brachytherapy Waste Audit Toolkit (fill out form to gain access to toolkit): https://forms.gle/o6tCvC3xL86trJPi6
Institute of Physics and Engineering in Medicine (IPEM) Sustainability Committee on Twitter: https://twitter.com/IPEMEnvironment
GreenHealth Lab (co-founded by radiation oncologist); https://greenhealth.ucsf.edu/
Scientific letter that documents energy consumption of LINAC per patient course, and identifies “Standby” as phase with greatest energy consumption: https://www.advancesradonc.org/article/S2452-1094(22)00275-5/fulltext?dgcid=raven_jbs_aip_email
In Episode 18, Marc and Adesh dive into an article recently published in the Lancet Planetary Health, titled "Hospitalisations for cardiovascular and respiratory disease among older adults living near unconventional natural gas development: a difference-in-differences analysis". The authors were Kevin Trickey, Zihan Chen and Prachi Sanghavi. Tune in to find out how the fracking boom in Pennsylvania affected the health of residents and why using natural gas as a bridging fuel detrimentally affects our health.
In this landmark study published in the Lancet Planetary Health by Altman and team, titled "Associations between outdoor air pollutants and non-viral asthma exacerbations and airway inflammatory responses in children and adolescents living in urban areas in the USA: a retrospective secondary analysis", the authors link specific air pollutants to unique molecular pathways of airway inflammation and also demonstrate that air pollution exacerbates asthma independent of any triggering virus. Join Adesh and Marc to find out more!
In this episode, Adesh speaks with NHS Consultant Dr Alex Wilkinson on the environmental impact from asthma care, and more specifically metered dose inhalers. Dr Wilkinson shares his thoughts on what respiratory medicine needs to be doing in order to move towards zero or low carbon care.
Article: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9056443/
Website links:
1. https://www.greenerpractice.co.uk/high-quality-and-low-carbon-asthma-care/
2. https://greeninhaler.org
In this episode, Adesh and Marc discuss a recent paper published in the Royal Society Publishing (Biology Letters) by Colin Carlson, Ellen Bannon, Emily Mendenhall, Timothy Newfield and Shweta Bansal, which was titled "Rapid range shifts in African Anopheles mosquitoes over the last century". Tune in to hear about the potential implications for Malaria transmission in Africa over the coming century!
In this new episode, hosts Marc Futernick and Adesh Sundaresan explore how climate change is driving increases in rates of preterm deliveries around the world, using a brilliant Review article recently published by Luis Federico Bátiz, Sebastián E. Illanes, Roberto Romero, María del Valle Barrera, Citra N.Z. Mattar, Mahesh A. Choolani, Matthew W. Kemp, titled "Climate change and preterm birth: A narrative review"in the journal Environmental Advances.
In Episode 14, our hosts bring you an original article published in the Lancet Planetary Health in May 2022, titled “Long term exposure to wildfires and cancer incidence in Canada: a population-based observational cohort study”. The authors were Jill Korsiak, Lauren Pinault, Tanya Christidis, Richard T Burnett, Michael Abrahamowicz and Scott Weichenthal.
Tune in to hear how your risk of lung and brain cancer might be impacted by repeated wildfire smoke exposure over periods of time!
Article: DOI: 10.1016/S2542-5196(22)00067-5
In this episode, we speak to the founders of the world's first ever 100% compostable isolation gown, Jonathan Mustich and John Sharpe. Jonathan and John discuss their new company, Biogown, and the unique product they are taking to markets around the world - which rivals many of the existing plastic gowns both in function and cost.
Find out more at the website below:
https://thebiogown.com
In part two of our dive into how droughts affect human health, our hosts bring you an article published in the British Medical Journal (October 2020), titled "Protecting health in dry cities: considerations for policy makers". The authors were Howard Frumkin, Maitreyi Bordia Das, Maya Negev, Briony C Rogers, Roberto Bertollini, Carlos Dora, Sonalde Desai. Tune in to learn what is meant by a 'healthy dry city’ and hear about some of the challenges of living in dry cities. You will also hear about ways in which we can conserve and promote health in these dry cities.
Article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/bmj.m2936
Hosts: Marc Futernick, Adesh Sundaresan
In this episode, Adesh talks with trailblazer emergency physician Dr Stefan Wheat. Stefan has recently launched Climate Rx, an innovative tool to help healthcare providers and health professionals educate their patients on the impacts of climate change on their health, ways to protect their health in a changing climate, and how to get more involved.
ClimateRx provides tools, training, peer-reviewed information, and opportunities to take action.
You can find out more on their website below:
https://www.climaterx.org/
Host: Dr Adesh Sundaresan
Guest: Dr Stefan Wheat
In Episode 12, Marc and Adesh delve into a Review published in the Annual Review of Public Health in December 2022, titled "Public Health Implications of Drought in a Climate Change Context: A Critical Review". Learn about how droughts affect our health, from worsening infectious diseases and air pollution, to causing undernutrition and malnourishment.
Article: https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-publhealth-071421-051636
Hosts: Marc Futernick, Adesh Sundaresan
In Episode 5 of Be the Change, Adesh has an insightful conversation with dentist Dr Laurie Houston from Ontario, Canada. Dr Houston shares her experiences with pushing for regulatory changes as well as her thoughts on healthcare waste including micro plastics.
https://www.oralhealthgroup.com/features/covid-and-the-failure-to-challenge/
https://cape.ca/the-life-cycle-of-plastic-is-a-death-spiral/
Host: Adesh Sundaresan
Guest: Dr Laurie Houston
In Episode 11, Marc and Adesh talk us through a study from 2020 that was published in the Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, which looked at the association between climate change and suicide, titled "Climate Change and Risk of Completed Suicide", by authors Caroline Dumont, MD, Elizabeth Haase, MD, Trygve Dolber, MD, Janet Lewis, MD, and John Coverdale, MD, MEd.
DOI: 10.1097/NMD.0000000000001162
Hosts: Marc Futernick, Adesh Sundaresan
In our first episode of 2023, Dr Preeti Jaggi and Adesh explore a Review titled "Climate change and child health: a scoping review and expanded conceptual framework", that was published in the Lancet Planetary Health.
https://doi.org/10.1016/S2542-5196(20)30274-6
Hosts: Preeti Jaggi, Adesh Sundaresan