Title: Nurses and Environmentalists: Creating Strength and Value through New Alliances
Author:
Section/SPIG: Environment
Issue Date:
Nurses care deeply about people’s health. Environmentalists care deeply about the environment. Lo and behold, these two communities have discovered a new common ground where the environment and health converge. Several new and emerging campaigns, networks, and collaborations are supporting nurses and others in their efforts to work on this new common ground called environmental health - a condition in which all living things can thrive.
1. Commonweal Network
In March 2004, at a beautiful northern California retreat center, a dozen each of national nursing leaders and national environmentalist leaders came together for three days of learning each others’ language and values and forging new relationship based on their discovery and recognition of shared interests and concerns. The attendees have formed a network of environmentalists and nursing organizations that are committed to continue the momentum established during the meeting in a variety of ways:
- Imagining what we would do differently in nursing practice - at the bedside, with building design, about health economics, and with our scientific research agenda - if we had a health care system based on a deep understanding of the unity of personal and planetary health.
- Working with major nursing educational organizations such as the American Association of the College of Nurses and the National League of Nursing to raise awareness and develop a strategy for better integration of environmental health concepts into basic, advanced, and continuing education.
- Enhancing nursing’s workplace advocacy and collective bargaining activities by incorporating environmental health into our efforts to improve nursing working conditions.
- Actively engaging within the nursing community and in partnerships with others towards a goal of healthy people and a healthy environment and recognizing that they are inextricable.
Brenda Afzal, RN, MS, at the Environmental Health Education Center of the University of Maryland School of Nursing, is the “Secretariat” for the follow-up activities from the national retreat and will be facilitating continued information sharing and communication. Information on the follow-up activities will be incorporated into the enviRN Web site: <www.enviRN.umaryland.edu>. To find out more about the national efforts, please contact Ms. Afzal: <afzal@son.umaryland.edu>.
2. Nursing and Environmental Health - APHA Convergence
A new Environmental Health Task Forcehas been established within the Public Health Nursing Section that includes members of the Environmental Health Section as a way of bridging these two important sections in the prospective work of the Task Force. The goals of the Task Force are to:
- Enhance the PHN Section’s environmental health awareness, expertise, and commitment;
- Develop a formal collaborative relationship with the Environmental Health Section for purposes of sharing expertise, addressing critical issues, and developing joint programs, which will serve as a model for inter-sectional collaborations;
- Develop APHA and PHN program sessions for the annual meetings, including research, education and service endeavors; and
- Make recommendations on broader strategic efforts that can enhance environmental health knowledge and skill in public health nursing.
A full-day, preconference workshop is being planned for the 2004 Annual Meeting to increase public health nurses’ capacity to take leadership roles on environmental health – within their state and local health departments; in local, state, and national policy-making; in academic institutions – for environmental health education and research; and as trusted sources of information within our professional and personal communities.
We welcome all public health nurses and environmental health professionals to join the Environmental Health Task Force to discuss and address critical environmental health issues from a public health perspective. Marjorie Buchanan chairs the new Task Force - <marjorieon@aol.com>. Come and help us imagine what our public health mission should look like if our ultimate goal is public and planetary health.
3. Collaborative for Health and the Environment (CHE)
The Collaborative for Health and the Environment is a network of individuals and organizations that focuses on helping us better understand the science regarding the association between environmental risks and health outcomes. It does this by mining the existing peer-reviewed science and current reports by governmental and non-governmental organizations and presenting it in cogent, accessible ways for health professionals and patients/families who are affected by specific diseases that may be associated with an environmental risk. Every month, there is a free hour-long briefing on the science associated with a specific topic. Past presentations have included Parkinson’s Disease, mercury poisoning, and infertility. Access to these briefings is available to all those who register with the CHE campaign, via their Web site: <www.CHEforhealth.org>. An associated Web site has been created that contains summaries of peer-reviewed papers and categorizes them for easy retrieval – see: <www.protectingourhealth.org>.
In addition to disseminating the science, CHE helps to connect organizations that represent health-affected groups such as the Endometriosis Association and Breast Cancer Action to scientists and advocates who are working on the environmental health risks associated with specific health problems. When people are interested in deeper exploration of a subject or issue, workgroups are convened. For instance, the Learning and Developmental Disabilities Initiative workgroup is made up of people who are concerned about people with learning disabilities, mental retardation, autism, and other developmental disabilities. This particular group sponsored a national meeting in May 2004. Workgroups are made up of people with the diseases of concern, their families, the practitioners who care for them, and scientists. Communication within the workgroups is facilitated by free monthly conference calls to discuss both science and policies issues.
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Barbara Sattler, RN, DrPH, FAAN, <bsattler@son.umaryland.edu>, is the Director of the Environmental Health Education Center at the University of Maryland School of Nursing, the home of the first Masters Degree and Post Masters Certificate in Environmental Health Nursing, <www.enviRN.umaryland.edu>.